We got the extended warranty on the Explorer we bought. I am glad we did since it turned out to be a piece of shit and needed a ton of work. And that warranty required all maintenance, including oils changes, to be preformed at the dealership.

It was all free during the warranty period so it was fine with me.

quote:

Originally posted by FishOn:
Wouldn't the low oil warning light come on in time to pull over before seizing the engine?

Really hard to know. Getting details from a 20 year old is difficult. Not to mention he may be embarrassed to tell me if he screwed up.

Double gasket. The original stuck to the oil pan and he added a new gasket to the plug on reinstall.
I've done it. Plug never came out but it was finger tight on next oil change

quote:

Double gasket. The original stuck to the oil pan and he added a new gasket to the plug on reinstall.
I've done it. Plug never came out but it was finger tight on next oil change

^^^^^^^^^^^^
Likely possibility. The warning lights come on at the last second. Dont ask me how I know.

Not that it matters at this point but I'd look where he parks at night and see if there's oil drips. Unlikely it just came loose that quickly.
There is no real pressure to force it out and other things like seals would blow out first.
Other than someone tampering with it, it most likely wasn't tight enough or overtightened and striped the threads.

Sorry this happened to you/your son.

I don't think it's a question of who changed, the oil, but rather, it's not covered by warranty because the engine failure was caused by an external event, not any fault of a Toyota product.

It's not Toyota's fault the oil came out, unless you could prove the oil drain plug threads failed or had a defect, etc.

For example, if the oil pump failed and then engine seized, that I think would be covered.

My 3rd party extended warranty says to have the vehicle serviced per the mfg maintenance schedule, and to keep all receipts.

This sounds like a total BS 20 y/o story to take the blame away from him, or malfeasance by a known (to him) individual.

Oil plugs don't shoot out like 45/70 slugs, double gaskets don't make all oil leak out catastrophically at one time, stripped threads don't blow 6 quarts of oil out in a second, and Toyota engines don't have oil plugs and pans made out of Play-Doh or any other sub-par material.

We're talking about arguably the most reliable vehicle on the planet. Either your boy isn't telling the whole truth, or someone drained the oil from that truck.

Yeah he is screwed. No way to pay for repairs and owes much more than it’s worth.

Why does the warranty company know anything about him changing his own oil? If he replaced the plug and filled it up with oil, seems like it is an obvious covered repair. Anyway, the solution may be to finance a used or remanufactured engine. As I tell my kids, gather information...don't provide it.

I'm thinking more on the vandalism theory. Maybe it was not him, someone mistook his truck for a different one that they have a grudge against the owner? Backtrack, was it parked in a parking lot where someone could have gotten to it? But as you brought up the embarrassment factor, could he not want to admit that someone has a grudge against him?

Reason I bring up the mistaken vehicle theory. There was an incident a long time ago in high school, an ex friend saw what he thought was my car in a parking lot, covering all the windows with white liquid shoe polish, juvenile league vandalism. Fortunately for me my car was home all day, I was there sick all day. In fact he called me to gloat about it but abruptly ended the call when he found out that it wasn't my car.

Seems that he ran into an acquaintance of mine that did not know how to get in touch with me, he was bragging up how he whitewashed "my" car windows, he ran into him at the mall before he called my house.

As I felt sorry for the owner of that car it was too bad that the moron didn't get caught in the act by him.

LQK donor motor

Donor engine for $2950

Hopefully he learns not to over extend on what he can afford in a vehicle in the future. When you're upside down in a vehicle you aren't in financial control.

I have seen one oil drain plug come loose, and it did it repeatedly. Also know of someone's car where the drain plug fell out.

Most likely it was not tightened enough, or the threads gave out. If a new plug went in and fully tightned, could have been the double seal as mentioned above, not tight enough, or a vandalism.

A future possiblity: glue the drain plug in with red Loctite, and pump the oil out each time through the dip stick. You can also add a drain plug with a hose connection, and run the hose up into the engine compartment. This is a typical boat setup.

quote:

Originally posted by Krazeehorse:
Hopefully he learns not to over extend on what he can afford in a vehicle in the future. When you're upside down in a vehicle you aren't in financial control.

Yeah out of all this one thing I’m glad about is him learning a valuable lesson. He also admitted to me, basically, that he should have listened to me long ago. I told him not to buy a vehicle that took all his money. He just said to me that he can’t do this again or he won’t ever be out on his own. He plans to somehow get this fixed and trade it in for a civic. I think he’s go. A be fucked a lot because I don’t think it’s trade will be worth what he owes even after it’s fixed.

quote:

Originally posted by Rev. A. J. Forsyth:
This sounds like a total BS 20 y/o story to take the blame away from him, or malfeasance by a known (to him) individual.

Oil plugs don't shoot out like 45/70 slugs, double gaskets don't make all oil leak out catastrophically at one time, stripped threads don't blow 6 quarts of oil out in a second, and Toyota engines don't have oil plugs and pans made out of Play-Doh or any other sub-par material.

We're talking about arguably the most reliable vehicle on the planet. Either your boy isn't telling the whole truth, or someone drained the oil from that truck.

I agree besides most on this forum thinking Toyota is infallible. Also how would he know if it went "shooting out". It's also possible he doesn't want to admit to offloading and having it knocked off by something on the trail and then not stopping when the oil light came on. Plenty of people have seen the oil light come on and keep driving thinking they need an oil change instead. To be honest the manufacturers should make the low oil light much more obvious that you need to pull over immediately.

For what it's worth. I never saw leaks under my car.

One day it was at the dealer up on a lift, and I saw some kind of panel below the engine that, had there been any leaks, would have "caught" any engine fluids.

That's when I realized there were leaks. I wasn't seeing the evidence.

Perhaps that's why your son didn't see any evidence of leaks.

Good luck.

My brother did the same thing in the early 70's with his 1967 Camaro

It is a lesson learned. That's all.

I miss Para's guy on the tube.

He’s definitely not off-roading where he lives. Lol.

This is either sabotage or user error. Drain plugs don't shoot out, even when cross-threaded. No warranty or insurance company would cover this. Just the way it is.

Oil in the pan is not under high pressure, it's just a reservoir to pull oil from. His plug did not shoot out. Cross treading would not cause it to fall out either. It's possible he finger tightened it, then forgot to hit it with a wrench or socket.