I was driving along today (about 40mph) and I looked in the rear view mirror and saw smoke. I immediately looked at the oil pressure gauge and right when I looked down, I saw the oil pressure gauge go to 0. It was not safe for me to turn off the engine and stop, I drove it at low rpm for about 1 minute until I could get in safe area. Everything was running fine when I shut down the engine. The head temps were normal. I have not started the engine since.

It turns out that one of the lines for my external oil cooler tore. I was able to get the car home on a friends trailer. I had fresh oil in the engine when the line tore.

What are the chances that I majorly screwed up my engine? How can I find out if I did?

Until it seizes...

I had a similar occasion with my rotary. Tore off the oil drain plug after hitting a bump on the highway. Shut the motor down but had to restart to get it safely off the road. Engine was fine after repair and refilling. Both the T4 and Rotary rely heavily on oil for lube and cooling. Hopefully yours is OK.

Figure out the problem and then act like nothing happened, unless there are scary noises.

A popular pastime at VW meets is to drain all the oil from an engine and run it until it blows. It usually takes a considerable amount of time.

Once they did this with a motor from a Fox, the old 1.8 liter straight 4. It ran for several hours with no oil at all until it ran out of gas.

I'd say your motor is likely just fine.

True, but sometimes they also blow in ten minutes, with the rods glowing red hot. I've done pretty much the same thing and lost an engine. My son autocrosses a Subaru bug and when stock, no windage tray, those motors have problems with oil starvation on long sweepers. He also lost an engine, and that was only a few seconds, just a blip of the oil pressure light, though at high RPM's. There's an in-car U-Tube video if you're curious about how an engine sounds when it's coughing up its guts.

You do have some slack. Every time you start it the engine runs without oil pressure, until it comes up, but a minute is still a long long time. I'd say you've probably scuffed the bearings some. Scuffing is just wear, exactly what happens over years of use, so it's like aging your engine. But no way to know how much without taking things apart. I'd suggest just putting in oil, starting it and watching the oil pressure gauge. You may have lost some pressure from before, from wear, or if you're lucky maybe not.

Let us know, I'm curious to hear how it turns out.

You may have crystallized your rings. Have someone follow you as you drive and they will see the smoke quickly. Or not.

If I remember correctly, there was a commercial featuring Al Unser Sr for some sort of snake oil where they pulled the drain plug on an engine, and ran it around the track for quite some time with no oil. I imagine as long as there's an oil film on the surfaces, it can live. However, it can't be doing anything good to the engine internals.

LOL. Exactly right, and probably the best advice you'll get.

Add oil, leave the old filter in place, start the engine, run it for a couple minutes then pull the filter. Cut it apart with a sharp knife. Don't use a grinder on the edge. Put the oil and filter material in a container. Look for a forensic chemist and have them test the oil for metal. If you can't find a place that does it contact a couple fleet trucking places. They have their oil tested regularly as a precaution.

Go from there. I had this done when I had an oil pressure issue with the Alien. It really helped finding out there was no metal in the oil.

Except for Rick's advice, even better.

Uh, maybe fix the massive leak first ? ........then add oil and watch the OP and listen...
Crystallized rings ????? way too many comic books.

With no load on the bearings, they need very little oil and should be ok. That is why the motors that people put on a stand and let run live for so long.

I say fix the leak and fill the oil. See how it sounds.

I say fix it, fill it and drive it like you stole it!

You will find out soon enough what it needs.

Get rid of those cheap-ass hoses and use aeroquip AQP.

When I had my first 914 back in high school I had the motor rebult and didn't know they didn't have oil in the motor. So when we got it I installed it and drove. Keep in mind the only lube was probably assemble lube. It drove for about a month before it seized, and that was driving it like a teenager drives any car.

So long story short, I woulnd't worry, in my opinion. But I did learn a valuable lesson.

I would put the oil in and run it. Then do as Rick said, change the filter and send that oil in to be tested. A company that does this is Blackstone Laboratories in Fort Wayne IN. You can look them up on the web. Call them and they will send you a free shipping kit to send your oil in through the US Mail. Good Luck.

Slick 50?

I'm impressed you guys can drive around with no oil (for a MONTH!?!?!) without damage, but I've lost oil pressure and engines in a few seconds. Here's another one going in a 50 second autocross run, you can see the oil pressure light blink for a tenth of a second mid-run, then the engine coughing at the end: Spinning a Subaru Rod Bearing.

That engine was being beaten, which of course is a really bad time to lose oil pressure. I can understand Slick 50 commercials and engine blows too, there's no load on the motor, but in use? You didn't put any particular load on it, so maybe not much damage, but none? Maybe. There's nothing to lose by putting in oil and starting it, if no noises using it, but I'd really take Rick's suggestion and get the filter checked. That's the only way to know where you are without taking it apart, or just driving around and worrying about odd or imagined noises from now on.

Will checking for metal in the oil change your final run/not run decision? I know if I found metal in my oil I'd probably keep running (disposable motor).


Side story: We once raced a Honda CBR600RR motor in an FSAE car for an estimated 2 hours with the oil relief valve in the oil pan (not providing oil pressure to the engine). It ran ok...until the intake cam snapped and stalled. The cam thrust is so low we actually managed to start it after that too. I've never seen bearing surfaces so worn!

I went back to the scene and looked at the oil slick. Aparently there was still a fairly decent amount of oil coming from the engine when I shut it off so It wasn't completely empty. There is also a huge amount of oil on my floor from sitting in my garage overnight. The oil looks brand new.

I am not going to send off the oil. If the engine sounds fine and the gauges read fine, I am just gonna run it. The results wouldn't change anything for me. Other may be different however if they did find metal I the oil, I'm not gonna tear apart the engine anyways.

Since oil was sprayed just about everywhere- what is the best way to clean the oil. The main problem areas are everything from flywheel back. I tried spraying engine greaser however it seemed like it just made it worse.

brake cleaner.

Windex and a roll of paper towels. That's how I cleaned mine. Get it up in the air and lay on the creeper and start cleaning.

in the north, we just call that under coating/rust proofing, and park it on the street for a week. :-P