He knows he'd get impeached for trying.

If metric is useful in the scientific community then so be it, but for practical lay people who work with their hands in the kitchen or sawing wood, it has serious drawbacks compared to feet-and-inches. The world loves to say it's just backward Americans wanting to be dominant and not play nice with the rest of the world, but for people who live in the real world and work with their hands with material objects, 11 times out of 12 it's easier to measure on-the-fly using a base-2 system instead of a base-10 system. It's easier to get "close enough" working fractionally (1/2 is too much, go down to a 1/4) than to shave off .2 of this and guess what 1.5823 of another looks like.

It goes without saying that I'm talking about completing tasks in which imprecision is acceptable. In actual scientific or manufacturing industry where tolerances are down to thousandths of an inch, I'm willing to say it really doesn't matter which system you use, since you have to have special equipment regardless. I'm talking specifically about the very, very many things we all do every day where a rough guess is more than adequate, and the easier the guess can be made the better.

I suspect that all further discussion of this should be in Open Discussion, but I won't be part of it since I don't have the patience for OD.

__________________


~Michael S.~
Past cars:

1986 300SDL
1987 300SDL
1982 240D
1982 300SD


Current:

1987 300SDL

Possibly.

It's certainly oil that comes from "somewhere".

I've noticed that on extended highway trips my oil consumption appears to increase yet the oil level stays roughly the same after driving around town or idling for long periods.

Currently, the dipstick reading is back where it started just before a 400 mile Xmas road trip. It went from 2/3 to just below 1/2 when I checked it after the trip.

After sitting one month, it's back to 2/3. I've put about 50 miles on the car in short trips this week and, when checked cold, the oil level has stayed there.

My hunch is that higher engine rpm forces oil everywhere, including normally low flow/no flow areas. Given enough, time it will drain back into the oil pan.

I've read other threads where owners mentioned their oil consumption increases on the highway. If I'm correct, it's not really "consumed" at all.

I spent several years operating a diesel power plant in Antarctica (hence my handle). Low load generators consumed significantly more oil than those operating at capacity due to wet stacking. In my line of thinking, then, a diesel Merc driving at highway speeds seals better. If correct, that should cause higher compression and less blow by, Ergo, less oil consumed.

Given enough time, I wonder if their dipstick reading would also gradually go back to normal?

__________________
1974 240D "Boldie" 170K.- New timing chain/freshly rebuilt IP/replaced valve seals/injectors/upgraded stereo/new Bilsteins with Yokohamas/fresh paint and rocker panels plus lots of welds.

Hey Busted,
My post didnt say that metrication was necessarily better, just that the vast majority of the world use it.
I grew up with imperial units & then had to change.
These days I work with both.
Even my jeep that was built on your side of the pond has a mixture of imperial, metric & torx on it.

__________________
Grumpy Old Diesel Owners Club group

I no longer question authority, I annoy authority. More effect, less effort....

1967 230-6 auto parts car. rust bucket.
1980 300D now parts car 800k miles
1984 300D 500k miles
1987 250td 160k miles English import
2001 jeep turbo diesel 130k miles
1998 jeep tdi ~ followed me home. Needs a turbo.
1968 Ford F750 truck. 6-354 diesel conversion.
Other toys ~J.D.,Cat & GM ~ mainly earth moving

I believe that at high highway rpms there is evidence by many that oil consumption increases on the 240ds. If they were like this when new is not known by me.

I have always thought that up to one quart per 1300 miles is a pretty fair engine still. I may be even aiming a little high. You will always almost be boiling off any condensate accumulated from all the prior local the trips that the oil temperature does not reach more than the boiling point of water as well remember.

This may or may not be an additional factor in the equation. I remember buying a local car and driving it a hundred and firty miles as soon as I got it on the highway. The oil level dropped two quarts. It was all condensate. That engine burnt basically no oil after.

It is a wonder the engine had not been damaged by the previous aparently constant treatment of only very short local drives. Probably experienced few oil changes as well during that time. Hard service should be respected as such.

One possibility is that the oil cooler is draining down when the car sits, hence 'increasing' the level of the oil. Then, when on the highway, the engine gets up to 'oil cooler required' temperature, the thermostat opens and the oil cooler refills. I don't know if this is really possible but I wouldn't exclude it since the top of the oil cooler is considerably higher than the top of the oil level in the sump.

__________________
1977 300d 70k--sold 08
1985 300TD 185k+
1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03
1985 409d 65k--sold 06
1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car
1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11
1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper
1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4
1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13

Answered my own question, sort of. 1 quart.

After ~ 1800 miles and 8 months on the last oil change, I grew impatient. I'm hoping to test the fuel economy of several types of injectors soon. So getting rid of the old oil would be ideal, anyway.

Once I'd drained the pan and removed the filter housing, it took 4 quarts to get to the add line. Another quart moved it to the full indent.

After starting and idling for 5 minutes, the level dropped to just below the add mark. I added another quart and it brought the level to about 3/4" between low and full. Based on previous experience, it might gradually rise a little higher today.

Since the oil level was about this when I started draining and was also around around the same level after the last oil change, that means I burned very little, if any, oil over the past 8 months.

My question now is how can an OM616 with compression @ 300 and obvious symptoms of blow by seem to not use any oil?

On second thought, don't answer that. After reading Barry's post about 1300 miles/quart being exceptional, I don't want to invite bad karma

__________________
1974 240D "Boldie" 170K.- New timing chain/freshly rebuilt IP/replaced valve seals/injectors/upgraded stereo/new Bilsteins with Yokohamas/fresh paint and rocker panels plus lots of welds.