Oil Light

[jaythebass]

Hi folks

The oil light on my 2014 Focus Titanium has started to flash intermittently and then staying on all the time even though after checking, there is plenty of oil in the engine. Has anyone any ideas what the issue is? 

[Luke4efc]

What engine is it?

[jaythebass]

18 minutes ago, Luke4efc said:

What engine is it?

1.0 EcoBoost 

[Luke4efc]

Have you done an oil change/flush recently?

[jaythebass]

2 minutes ago, Luke4efc said:

Have you done an oil change/flush recently?

Not in the last couple of years. Not sure if it's my imagination but since the light had been on the engine sounds a little rough

[Luke4efc]

If you haven't done an oil change for a couple of years I'd start there, your current oil will be like sludge lol.

You also shouldn't do engine flushes on these, the chemicals will degrade the wet belt and the pickup for the oil pump will get blocked.

[jaythebass]

3 minutes ago, Luke4efc said:

If you haven't done an oil change for a couple of years I'd start there, your current oil will be like sludge lol.

You also shouldn't do engine flushes on these, the chemicals will degrade the wet belt and the pickup for the oil pump will get blocked.

Thanks for this, I appreciate it! I have put some more oil in it so there is at least some fresh oil there. I'll sort out getting an oil change done. Also, the start/stop function has been disabled, is this related? 

[Luke4efc]

13 minutes ago, jaythebass said:

Not sure if it's my imagination but since the light had been on the engine sounds a little rough

If your oil light is coming on then you're starving the engine of vital lubricants. I'm not surprised it sounds rough, every second it stays on is significantly wearing your engine.

6 minutes ago, jaythebass said:

Also, the start/stop function has been disabled, is this related? 

Probably not. It's usually caused by short journeys meaning the battery isn't fully charging. If the car isn't happy with the battery condition, it will turn off the stop/start.

6 minutes ago, jaythebass said:

I have put some more oil in it so there is at least some fresh oil there

Does that mean you've lost oil too? I'd be very surprised if it's dropped more than half way between services.

[jaythebass]

5 minutes ago, Luke4efc said:

If your oil light is coming on then you're starving the engine of vital lubricants. I'm not surprised it sounds rough, every second it stays on is significantly wearing your engine.

Probably not. It's usually caused by short journeys meaning the battery isn't fully charging. If the car isn't happy with the battery condition, it will turn off the stop/start.

Does that mean you've lost oil too? I'd be very surprised if it's dropped more than half way between services.

Maybe I should put a little more in tomorrow...it's not losing any oil to my knowledge, there's no tell-tale puddles or stains on the ground and no blue smoke. 

 

I'll get an oil change booked as soon as I can

[Luke4efc]

27 minutes ago, jaythebass said:

Maybe I should put a little more in tomorrow...it's not losing any oil to my knowledge, there's no tell-tale puddles or stains on the ground and no blue smoke. 

 

I'll get an oil change booked as soon as I can

Right, but what does the dipstick say? You'll cause even more damage if you go above the max fill line lol.

Your engine takes like 4 litres of oil. Adding a few hundred ml isn't going to make a blind bit of difference to the condition of your existing oil.

[F0CUE]

It's very easy to do it yourself. Put the car on jack stands and away you go. 

 

[unofix]

Before your engine turns in to a bag of spanners --- "Get the oil and filter changed". Your car is telling you it needs help, "oil Light" on.

On the other hand you could save the money by not doing an oil change and wait awhile and put the cash towards the cost of a new engine.

[Botus]

std ford feature... fit a spring that's fit for purpose on the oil pressure relief valve

 

 

[Botus]

just read the post again....

stop driving till you know the cause.

as less and less people grow up playing with cars all the time, many seem unaware its not a low oil light.... its a NO oil PRESSURE light

these days with bad drivers, yes, it often comes on as its run low on oil.  That's because there's nothing left to pump round, hence the light comes on.  If you weren't driving hard at high speed and the low oil gets hotter and hotter (past 280C and it fell to bits) and the engine just self destructs, you might get away with topping it up.  But you will have taken years of good service life out of the car at best.

flickering at idle or on from start and only goes off above 2k rpm is bad and might be the pressure relief valve

on all the time, could be trashed engine / dodgy pump / relief valve / low oil / dented sump blocking the strainer or a faulty sensor or wiring glitch

 

[JW1982]

Being a 1.0 ECOboost the inlet of the oil pump will most likely be blocked with particles of the wetbelts.

The usage of Incorrect oil specifications and not respecting the service intervals are well known to cause the wetbelts to disintegrate.

Another problem that is known to affect the wetbelts is mainly driving short distances. Mainly driving short distances causes the engine oil to be polluted with condensation and unburned fuel. Condensation and unburned fuel causes the additives inside the ford WSS-M2C948-B engine oil to debond and form a sludge inside the sump. This seriously affects the quality/characteristics of the engine oil and also causes the wetbelts to disintegrate. Driving short distances must be considered to be "extreme conditions" and require reduced service intervals.

 

Once the oil pressure light starts flashing the engine should be shut down immediately. Running the engine with the flashing oil pressure light will result in serious engine wear/damage. The fact that the engine is running rough suggests that the engine suffered from excessive wear and is probably beyond repair already.