Found a decent sized oil leak under the LS on the driveway today

[lsintoronto]

Went to move the LS this afternoon and found a decent sized oil leak on the driveway. Haven't checked the oil level itself but it looked pretty clear/clean for oil that is at least a month old in the car. Crawled under the car but couldn't tell where it's coming from but appears to be from the passenger rear side of the engine. Oil filter looks dry. I'm puzzled because we were out earlier and didn't have any indication of an issue, it appears to be a fair bit of oil on the driveway, no lights came on the dash (eg. low oil).

Morning plans are to get the car on level service and check fluid levels but can't get it into a shop until Monday to get it checked out.

 

[joegr]

...y, no lights came on the dash (eg. low oil)...

You do know (or should know) that the LS has no low oil level light? (I guess that's one thing they didn't copy from BMW.)
It does have a no-oil-pressure light. By the time that light comes on, it might as well be a replace engine light.

 

[RigsLS]

In reality they ought to just simply replace all engine lights in all cars with "OPEN WALLET" indicators.

 

[lsintoronto]

I have to admit I should know that it doesn't have a low oil light but I didn't (my Volvo has 2 indicators: Low Oil - Fill Oil and Low Oil - Turn Engine Off...or something close to it). Not going to drive the car until Monday when I'll take it back to the dealer who did the oil change recently to have it checked out.

Picked up a spare jug of 5W-20 and checked the oil level which is actually low but pretty clear/clean as the car has not seen much mileage since the last oil change. Just had a small spot on the driveway overnight and moved it to the road this morning to check the oil level (driveway has an incline) and not much oil there after a couple hours - but that probably has to do with the low oil level.

 

[fudge12]

You do know (or should know) that the LS has no low oil level light? (I guess that's one thing they didn't copy from BMW.)
It does have a no-oil-pressure light. By the time that light comes on, it might as well be a replace engine light.

WOW really? The price this car cost when new could've at least had a low oil level light. I do see the no oil pressure light come on at idle but it does go away when i press the accelerator or switch gears. I don't mean to threadjack but am I looking at bad switch or oil pump?

 

[Telco]

Is it definitely oil or is it transmission fluid. That picture seems to have a reddish tint to it. Oh, if only there were a way by which the owner of the car could quickly and easily determine if the transmission fluid were low! But wait, it's a sealed unit, so nobody EVER needs to be able to check that!

You can take a clean white paper towel and push it into the leak on the ground to get the color, and tell what you are dealing with.

I'm also assuming you just pulled the car straight up to take the picture. If so, that is right along where a leak in the trans cooler to radiator connection line would be. You would need to pull the underside covers off to get a good look at this area.

Now if you didn't, I've heard of a prank where one of your neighbors will sneak over and pour fluid under your car like that. Successful runs of this prank have been to cause the car owner to spend a couple thousand in repair attempts, ultimately trading their car off for a new one. Whereupon the neighbor begins again...

 

[lsintoronto]

LOL! My neighbours weren't home so they're off the hook on this one. We pulled into the driveway after running some errands then I went to work changing a couple of the engine mounts on the Volvo. A couple hours after, went to move the cars around to pull my Mustang out of the garage and found that spill. At first I thought it was water from the A/C but it was oil (color was like that of almost new oil - light yellow/brown not red - thought it may have been trans fluid since that was changed a few weeks before the engine oil was changed).

The Volvo is parked above the oil spill. and the LS was moved to the right. The spill looks like it is positioned around where the rear right (passenger) side of the engine would have been when the LS was parked there. Haven't seen much oil under the car since that spill (checked the level again tonight with engine off and it didn't appear too low - still in check-marked area on dip stick.

 

[Telco]

Rough one. All you can really do is get it up in the air and get under it with a strong light.

Oh, and are you absolutely certain that the oil stain wasn't there when you pulled in? Perhaps someone else with a leaky engine pulled into your driveway for a bit while you were gone?

 

[lsintoronto]

Rough one. All you can really do is get it up in the air and get under it with a strong light.

Oh, and are you absolutely certain that the oil stain wasn't there when you pulled in? Perhaps someone else with a leaky engine pulled into your driveway for a bit while you were gone?

Hmm never thought of that one...I'll check with my neighbours to see if anyone has a camera :shifty:

I crawled under it with the car on ramps but couldn't see an obvious place where the oil was coming from.

 

[lsintoronto]

WOW really? The price this car cost when new could've at least had a low oil level light. I do see the no oil pressure light come on at idle but it does go away when i press the accelerator or switch gears. I don't mean to threadjack but am I looking at bad switch or oil pump?

Probably time to get that looked at before it turns into big $$$.

 

[1LoudLS]

WOW really? The price this car cost when new could've at least had a low oil level light.

but it has an oil dipstick, so that would be a little redundant...

I do see the no oil pressure light come on at idle but it does go away when i press the accelerator or switch gears.

Probably time to get that looked at before it turns into big $$$.

By the time that light comes on, it might as well be a replace engine light.

tick tick boom

 

[LJS30]

I concur on this one. My old 88 Mark 7 has a functioning low oil level light. It warns you right when you are about a quart low.

 

[Telco]

Even my plain old regular cab pickup truck has one of those and it came out about the same time the LS did. That's what the little pale yellow thing on the oil pan at the bottom of the picture is.

Course then, my pickup is a Chevy and has other technologically advanced features like a transmission dipstick. And before anyone says it, my truck's original engine had over 250K miles on it and was running fine when I pulled it out. I wanted to try something with a different engine, but selected a really crappy engine builder to put it together for me. This engine is a new crate high output 5.3 that will put the other two to shame.

 

[LS4me]

My '86 Sable had one.......

 

[num1bigguy]

My 1986 town car warned after a quart low. My 2001 conti warned at about 1.5 quart low through the message center. My 1996 mark VIII warms about 1.5 quart low through the message center. Maybe ford was trying to make a little extra?