Dear Forum Members,

I baught my second hand 2003 Toyota Corolla in Sep. 2006 directly from a toyota dealer and never had any problem with it (before buying I asked them to check all the parts and also verified it through another service center and all of them confirmed that it is a good car. I changed the engine oil for the first time after buying the car in a Toyota Service Center.

The day before yesterday, I checked the dipstick for engine oil level and I was shocked when I saw it was completely dry ! I freaked out and went to the nearest Canadian Tire and asked them to check the engine and put some oil in it (by the way, during the last few months, the car was working perfectly, no strange noises, the temprature was normal, and the lamp for low level oil was never turned on). When the guy in Canadian Tire opened the oil tank, I saw that there was some oil in the tank, but I guess it wasn't 4 liters. I personally checked around the tank and also the oil filter and didn't notice any sign for leakage. Moreover there wasn't any sign of oil coming out of exhaust or white smoke.

I checked the dipstick yesterday and it was dry again. I'm planning to bring the car for inspection to a toyota service center, but I thought to post the question here too, does anybody know what is the cause of this strange behaviour ? Is it possible that the dipstick has been replaced with a shorter one from another model ?! One more thing, when the engine is on, and I check the dipstick, I actually see that there is oil in the engine, but when the car is not running, there is no sign of oil.

Please help,

There can be several reasons for that.

One I can think of right now is, the person who used to have the car probably put in thicker oil in it.

So when you put in the recommended oil in there, the engine got so use to using thicker oil, when it use a thinner oil, the oil get burn up quickly and you have no more oil in the car.

An engine will never "get used" to a thicker oil.
Does the car put any smoke out the tailpipe? If it puts out blue smoke, that means your piston rings are most likely shot.
If you dont find any leaks then thats just about the only place the oil can be going.
Id say take it to the shop and see what they say. Good luck.

Thank you so much for the replies,

I was under the assumption that if the oil was burning, I could have noticed the smoke from exhaust, but I never saw such a thing. The fact is the car was running so perfectly without any signs and having it serviced in a Toyota Service center, I never worried about checking the oil levels, ...

I'll bring the car to the center tommorrow.

If there are any other suggestions I really appreciate to hear them.

Thanks in advance,

Let us know what happens, ok? Will be interesting to hear the result and it's a circumstance we could all learn from. thanks.

Look at the ground at the area you park. Is there any fresh oil on the ground ?

Well I had a problem with something like that, leaky head gasket I belived. It was replaced twice on my old Breeze. Car was a lemon from the getgo. But with yours, it could be something simple but you defintily have a leak somewhere. Let us know what happens!

Hi again,

I tried calling the Toyota Service Center in my city (Waterloo, ON, Canada), and they were not helpful at all. Either the guy was having a bad day or ... He told me that if there isn't any visible leakage, the car must be burning oil and I should start checking the level and add oil as necessary. When I asked him if they need to inspect the car he replied No ! There isn't much that they can do except taking all the engine apart. That's very unfortunate for me. I still can't believe that I've been burned by my decision by going for toyota's reputation. I baught the car on Sep. 2006, it had around 55,000 kms on it (Corolla 2003 model), and I baught it from a Toyota Dealer, I never anticipated that this would be the outcome.

Anyways, making the long story short, I decided not going to the Toyota Service Center (at least not the one in waterloo, which happens to be the same center that I changed the oil for the first time after buying the car), because one of these two scenarioes must have happened:

1. The car had lost oil between Sep. 2006 and Feb 2006 that I asked them to change the oil, then the least that they could have done was to inform me (while they told me everything was fine).

2. Somehow oil loss has happened after Feb. 2006, which in my opinion is a direct consequence of something wrong that they've done with the car (and they are charging about twice everywhere else !).

I went to a private car shop and had someone inspect the car, here is what I've found out:

1. The dipstick does not show the oil level in engine in a linear way. At least in Corolla which needs about 4 liters, when the oil in engine is around 3.5 liters the dipstick shows empty and is dry.

2. The guy told me that most of the movable parts that need oil are in the lower parts of the engine, and although not recommended, the engines could work without any problem when the available oil is as low as two liters.

3. We checked beneath the car very carefully, and didn't see any sign of oil leakage or sticky surface (where the oil is sprayed onto it).

4. He told me that the black smut in the exhaust might be an indication of burning oil (although there wasn't much of it), he told me in some cases the oil is burnt very good (with the correct combination of oxygen, gas and oil !) and we don't see any blue or white smoke.

5. As per his recommendation I baught "Engine Flush" a liquid from Formula 1, which you should add it to engine oil and let the car to run for a few minutes before exchanging the oil, it is supposed to clean the internal parts and loosen the rings around piston, when I wanted to pour the liquid I noticed sticky, black and thick material around the openning, I don't know if it was there before or as a result of bad oil exchange or using the car with low amounts of oil.

6. He suggested me to use 10W30 instead of 5W30, which I did (the Corolla Manual says both are permissible but recommends 5W30).

Anyways, I'm checking the oil every few days, and am thinking about the next step. I'll try to call the Toyota Dealer that I baught the car and also the Toyota Customer Service (the national not local).

If you have any suggestions please tell me.

Thank you in advance,

That's interesting about the dipstick at 3.5 litres! But I'm glad you're feeling better about the car too.

Sounds to me like they could have been negligent in overlooking the problem before. I am wondering if it has something to do with a headgasket which is what was causing my oil leaks.

Hello all,

I thought to give an update regarding my car. In the last few weeks I was constantly monitoring the oil level. And I found one more thing. I drove the car more than 600kms inside the city and the oil level didn't change, and I started to think that maybe that Engine Flush thing has resolved the problem (later on, I read somewhere that those fluids are not effective at all). Then I went for another short trip (less than 300kms) and drove the car in the highway (mostly around 120km/h). Uppon return I checked the level and it was below the minimum again. So whatever the problem is, it is related to speed (maybe the piston rings are weared out, ...).

Anyways, I decided not to ignore the problem and follow it up with Toyota. I called the Toyota Dealer from which I baught the car, and they told me that it might be the ignorance of the previous owner (in oil change, ...) and unless I can bring the full service records (which are supposed to be done in Toyota Service Centers only) since the car was produced, they can not help me that much. Anyways, I talked with their manager and eventually they accepted that the repair is done under warranty (but I think that the problem with the car was so serious that they accepted that no ignorance could have caused such deffects !). Now the parts have been ordered (their total list price is around 3000$) and they are supposed to give me a call about when to bring the car (hopefully next week). I was extremely lucky not only that they accepted to cover it under warranty but also because the 5-year warranty of the car expires on July 12, 2007 !

I'll post another update when I get the car back (hopefully in two weeks from now).

I appreciate if you share your comments with me, what should I do/check/ask when I get the car back.

Best of luck to you all,

What is the $tealer replacing?

Wow that's a lot going on with the car, I hope that it gets all sorted out very fast for you. I wonder what the problem could be. I've never had my oil drop down like that...so I don't know, post when you get your car back and let us know if they fixed it properly! Good luck!