Oil's all gone!

growse · 14 Sep 2011 at 18:16

Just had an interesting experience. Just riding home from work, my BMW F800S picked up a sudden loud rattle on the power at about 3-4k rpm. No loss of power, just a big rattle. I stopped to look it over and couldn't find what it was, and couldn't reproduce it with the bike in neutral. I carefully rode it the 10 miles back and gave it a more thorough going over.

To my horror, the dipstick barely registered any oil in it! It's coming up for it's 18k service, but I'll buy some oil and do a full change / filter in the morning. In the meantime I have two questions:

1) How much damage have I done to it?
2) Where has it all gone? There's no noticable leaks or puddles, unlike previously where I've noticed a leaky oil cooler or valve gasket cover. It was changed at 12k and checked at 15 (I know, I know), but it's not obvious what's gone wrong here.

Help

ShakenNstirred · 14 Sep 2011 at 18:48

guess its been burning it if no leaks
check it more often

VoG · 14 Sep 2011 at 19:29

growse said:
1) How much damage have I done to it?
2) Where has it all gone?

1. Depends on what kind of bearings the crank runs on, where the oil scavenge port is for the oil pump, & how long it's been low on oil. oh & obviously how much stick you've been giving it whilst low on oil.

2. If it hasn't leaked then it's been burnt, do a compression check.

The loud rattle under load would have me looking at the crank, the last time i heared that kinda of noise it was on a plain bearing Z750 crank making it's presence known.

Change your oil & filter tomorrow, have a damn good look at your filter & old oil for swarf, as loud rattles are usually an indication of lack of oil by which times it's normally too late the damage is done, either to a bearing, or a bearing surface ( think twixt head & cam cap ).

fingers crossed for you

hillbilly2 · 14 Sep 2011 at 20:43

Did you see the oil light come on,on the dash?

acemastr · 14 Sep 2011 at 20:58

Can't see how it's used so much, my RR was changed at 11k miles, now on 15k and hasn't used a single drop, still rather clear and the same level.

Agree with the above posts, BMW might help you too, generally good guys

growse · 14 Sep 2011 at 21:13

VoG said:
1. Depends on what kind of bearings the crank runs on, where the oil scavenge port is for the oil pump, & how long it's been low on oil. oh & obviously how much stick you've been giving it whilst low on oil.

2. If it hasn't leaked then it's been burnt, do a compression check.

The loud rattle under load would have me looking at the crank, the last time i heared that kinda of noise it was on a plain bearing Z750 crank making it's presence known.

Change your oil & filter tomorrow, have a damn good look at your filter & old oil for swarf, as loud rattles are usually an indication of lack of oil by which times it's normally too late the damage is done, either to a bearing, or a bearing surface ( think twixt head & cam cap ).

fingers crossed for you

If it started rattling today, would that indicate it's been low for a while, or that it passed a certain threshold? There's been no indication on the oil light, I'd expect if oil pressure were to drop due to low oil then I'd see the light coming on?

Stupid question: what's a compression check?

If there has been damage, am I looking at expensive parts / hours and hours of labour, or might it not be that bad?

acemastr said:
Can't see how it's used so much, my RR was changed at 11k miles, now on 15k and hasn't used a single drop, still rather clear and the same level.

Agree with the above posts, BMW might help you too, generally good guys

Will buy oil from them tomorrow and have a chat then.

VoG · 14 Sep 2011 at 22:23

growse said:
If it started rattling today, would that indicate it's been low for a while, or that it passed a certain threshold? There's been no indication on the oil light, I'd expect if oil pressure were to drop due to low oil then I'd see the light coming on?

Stupid question: what's a compression check?

If there has been damage, am I looking at expensive parts / hours and hours of labour, or might it not be that bad?

It would indicate the oil has been low long enough to break down & cease to lubricate effectively, so it could well have been low for quiete some time. as for the oil light not coming on, personally i don't trust them, as oil level switches can fail/jam etc, there's no substitute for the mark 1 eye ball & physically looking at your oil level as part of your weekly check over.

A compression check is where you fit a compression gauge to your spark plug hole, & turn the engine over to check the compression of the cylinder is within spec. so, suppose your bike is meant to make 150PSI & the gauge returns a reading of 120PSI, that indicates a problem with either the rings, the barrel itself, or a valve.

If there has been damage, absolute worst case scenario would be crank damage needing a full engine strip, which would be heap big bills.

On the other hand it could be something immensly silly like somethings worked loose & coincidentally picked right that very moment to make a racket, which is why i said change your oil filter, if you can see shiny slivers of metal in the filter & or oil, you've got problems, if you can't, time to investigate further.

growse · 15 Sep 2011 at 15:52

I did the oil change.

Difficult to measure how much came out, it was a fair bit, and I'd guess about 2l. Bike takes 3l in. Oil looked free from contamination / metal bits and I filled it with 3l of new Castrol stuff. Running it at idle, it sounds fine, but the real test will be loading the engine up at around 3.5k rpms, so we'll see.

VoG · 15 Sep 2011 at 16:14

what was the filter like?.

Fireskull · 15 Sep 2011 at 16:36

Yea and was there any tiny pieces of metal attacked to the sum plug?

growse · 15 Sep 2011 at 18:30

Not looked at the filter in detail, but no bits of metal anywhere I could see...

growse · 19 Sep 2011 at 10:16

**Update**

So after taking it to the dealer at the end of last week and letting them do it's 18k service, it broke down on the A1 this morning. The dealer's opinion last week was "We don't know what it is, but if it were something serious you'd hear it rattle at all revs. Keep an eye on it and let us know".

This morning, started up, rattle was a bit quieter, so I'm thinking "It's gone away. Good." Then as the bike warms up, the rattle becomes a clatter and gets both louder and more prominent higher up the rev range. As I hit 10 miles in, it's now everywhere under power, and I'm losing power. I pull up on the hard shoulder and start to hear it clattering at idle. A quick listen indicates it might be bottom end. I give it a gentle rev, and see the oil light blink at me before it just dies. I don't even try and start it again. Dipstick says oil on the Max line, so my initial thought is oil pump failure.

It's back at the dealer now. Not exactly happy.

VoG · 19 Sep 2011 at 11:13

I have to say, i'm not impressed by the dealer one bit, they sound like a right bunch of amatuers.

We don't know what it is, but if it were something serious you'd hear it rattle at all revs

The bike shop i use wouldn't let it go any where till they did know what it was, just so i wouldn't end up hearing it rattle at all revs.

Really hope it turns out to be something simple & cheap, but given the idiocy of the dealer involved, i'm inclined to think it'll be any thing but.

hillbilly2 · 19 Sep 2011 at 21:06

What dealer was it? What colour engine is in your bike,black or silver?

growse · 19 Sep 2011 at 21:14

I'll just say it's a local BMW dealer to me at the moment. I don't want to give the appearance of slagging them off when they might come good. I also need to have an ongoing relationship with these guys.

Engine is silver. Bike's March '08.

hillbilly2 · 19 Sep 2011 at 21:32

I'm guessing you don't have extended warranty on the bike.The silver engines were not very good.They had a piston issue where the pistons would wear severely in the bores,causing them to thrust in the bores.They sound like a rattly diesel.BMW are still rebuilding the engines at full or partial contribution,but it depends if you have had full dealer servicing.They really wear a poor engine.The newer black engines are far better.

hillbilly2 · 19 Sep 2011 at 21:52

I hope the dealer sorts it all out for you

growse · 20 Sep 2011 at 08:43

hillbilly2 said:
I'm guessing you don't have extended warranty on the bike.The silver engines were not very good.They had a piston issue where the pistons would wear severely in the bores,causing them to thrust in the bores.They sound like a rattly diesel.BMW are still rebuilding the engines at full or partial contribution,but it depends if you have had full dealer servicing.They really wear a poor engine.The newer black engines are far better.

Is that the piston slap issue? I believed this was sorted end of 07 engines - I've certainly never had a slapping problem in the past. It's a noisy bugger for sure, but all of the 800's I've ridden, new and older, have been like that.

Just had a call from the dealer. They need to strip the engine and agree it "sounds quite bad". Hmmm.

*edit* just got an extended warranty quote at GBP25 per month. Wished I had got that earlier

TaKeN · 20 Sep 2011 at 09:29

Bad luck growse

, let us know how you get on!

hillbilly2 · 20 Sep 2011 at 10:11

growse said:
Is that the piston slap issue? I believed this was sorted end of 07 engines - I've certainly never had a slapping problem in the past. It's a noisy bugger for sure, but all of the 800's I've ridden, new and older, have been like that.

Just had a call from the dealer. They need to strip the engine and agree it "sounds quite bad". Hmmm.

*edit* just got an extended warranty quote at GBP25 per month. Wished I had got that earlier

No they did not sort it till the black engines.The black engines are a lot quieter. Ask for some good will from BMW.