Increased Oil Consumption Problem (2010 T5 Cali 180 bhp)

[Meoncoast]

share investment in Millers oil may be the only good bet in this 180 issue.

 

[briwy]

I'm getting baffled by this now.
Markhs results are obviously not good but he has no excessive oil consumption.
So how are all these nasties getting into the oil?
Surely if it's the EGR, which seems to be the popular opinion rightly or wrongly, then for the rubbish from the EGR to be getting into the oil it must be coming from the combustion chambers which would surely result in excessive oil consumption. Or is there another connection between the EGR and the crankcase? Or is it not in fact the EGR that's the problem?
Perhaps to minimise the problem the answer is for regular oil changes at say 10k.

Edit. Just wondering. Has anyone had an MOT fail yet on a180 engine due to it burning oil?

 

[Bobbybus]

...and what are the contaminates doing to bearings (crank, camshaft, turbo...), valve gear, dpf, cat...?

 

[briwy]

Knackering them I guess

 

[craigs902]

More info can be found at www.t5-life.com this site is set up for issues relating to the EGR failure on the VW.
More and more info is being added every day.


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[Looby]

For info.......We have never needed to top up our oil and have never had any warning lights or EGR issues. The van is rarely used for short journeys, some journeys are 30 mile-ish, most are much more and on quiet Scottish country roads with national speed limits. Even when camping most local exploring is done on bicycle, on foot or even public transport. over 99% of fuel fills are with Shell v-power.
I only did oil test because of concerns in this thread and got these results back today. The van is a 2014 180 bi-turbo engine. The test was based on van mileage of Just under 18,000 miles and less than 5,500 miles since last oil change.

 

[Spartan]

I think it could be helpful to step aside from the specifics of this case for a moment, to create a better understanding of oil usage generally . Apologies in advance since I know that many/most will already know the following.

On the subject of 'excessive oil consumption' in general there are many possible contributing factors, however, there are really only two common root causes for oil consumption (albeit not necessarily 'excessive'):

• Leaks - engine oil is getting past seals/gaskets/finding unexpected routes/holes etc. and is 'lost'
• Combustion - engine oil is finding it's way into the combustion chamber (see leaks) and being burned with the fuel and/or ejected with exhaust gasses.

If you suspect excessive oil consumption then, if you can rule out external leaks, the most probable cause - by default - is combustion.

By design, internal combustion engines [that use oil for lubrication] will consume some oil in the combustion chamber. It's the 'how much' that is important and, of course, this varies according to engine design, manufacture and usage. However, put simply, the primary reason is that the cylinder walls are separated from the pistons by a thin film of engine oil; the piston rings act as the gasket/seal in this case but they do not form a perfect seal - some oil is left on cylinder walls during the combustion/exhaust cycle and is consumed. A similar but secondary situation exists between the cylinder head valves and seals.

In a modern, well-designed & manufactured engine using modern oils, engine oil consumption of this type can be very small - effectively unnoticeable between oil changes (if checking by use of the dipstick alone). That is not to say that you do not need to check oil-levels between changes - certain uses and environments can temporarily increase oil consumption, for example, high temperatures, high revs, high load, excessive engine braking, wrong type/wrong viscosity of oil for conditions, etc.

Disregarding external oil leaks and the temporary causes just mentioned, excessive oil consumption indicates that there is an oil 'leak' into the combustion chamber. N.B. This does not necessarily mean the piston ring/cylinder wall seal: oil could also get into the combustion chamber via other routes. For example, via valve seals (as already mentioned), via air intake (besides the EGR system, most engines employ some form of positive crankcase and/or valve cover ventilation back to air intake*), via cylinder head gasket failure.

*High pressures can force oil (in liquid or vapour form) back into the combustion chamber via this route; this effect can be exacerbated in high compression (e.g. diesel) and/or forced induction (e.g. turbo) engines and/or where failure of a gasket/seal, leads to over-pressurisation of the crankcase/valve covers/turbo oil-ways/etc ...

So, back to the specifics of this case: for affected vehicles, the remedial action taken by VW (as documented in the relevant TPI) would suggest excessive oil consumption through failure of the piston ring/cylinder wall seal. In my opinion, the associated discussion (here and elsewhere) speculates as to the cause of that seal failure.

 

[2into1]

I think it could be helpful to step aside from the specifics of this case for a moment, to create a better understanding of oil usage generally . Apologies in advance since I know that many/most will already know the following.

On the subject of 'excessive oil consumption' in general there are many possible contributing factors, however, there are really only two common root causes for oil consumption (albeit not necessarily 'excessive'):

• Leaks - engine oil is getting past seals/gaskets/finding unexpected routes/holes etc. and is 'lost'
• Combustion - engine oil is finding it's way into the combustion chamber (see leaks) and being burned with the fuel and/or ejected with exhaust gasses.

If you suspect excessive oil consumption then, if you can rule out external leaks, the most probable cause - by default - is combustion.

By design, internal combustion engines [that use oil for lubrication] will consume some oil in the combustion chamber. It's the 'how much' that is important and, of course, this varies according to engine design, manufacture and usage. However, put simply, the primary reason is that the cylinder walls are separated from the pistons by a thin film of engine oil; the piston rings act as the gasket/seal in this case but they do not form a perfect seal - some oil is left on cylinder walls during the combustion/exhaust cycle and is consumed. A similar but secondary situation exists between the cylinder head valves and seals.

In a modern, well-designed & manufactured engine using modern oils, engine oil consumption of this type can be very small - effectively unnoticeable between oil changes (if checking by use of the dipstick alone). That is not to say that you do not need to check oil-levels between changes - certain uses and environments can temporarily increase oil consumption, for example, high temperatures, high revs, high load, excessive engine braking, wrong type/wrong viscosity of oil for conditions, etc.

Disregarding external oil leaks and the temporary causes just mentioned, excessive oil consumption indicates that there is an oil 'leak' into the combustion chamber. N.B. This does not necessarily mean the piston ring/cylinder wall seal: oil could also get into the combustion chamber via other routes. For example, via valve seals (as already mentioned), via air intake (besides the EGR system, most engines employ some form of positive crankcase and/or valve cover ventilation back to air intake*), via cylinder head gasket failure.

*High pressures can force oil (in liquid or vapour form) back into the combustion chamber via this route; this effect can be exacerbated in high compression (e.g. diesel) and/or forced induction (e.g. turbo) engines and/or where failure of a gasket/seal, leads to over-pressurisation of the crankcase/valve covers/turbo oil-ways/etc ...

So, back to the specifics of this case: for affected vehicles, the remedial action taken by VW (as documented in the relevant TPI) would suggest excessive oil consumption through failure of the piston ring/cylinder wall seal. In my opinion, the associated discussion (here and elsewhere) speculates as to the cause of that seal failure.

All very correct and hard to argue with, except you are ignoring the other data available : photos showing the worn bores and congested piston rings, the decayed internals of the egr cooler and the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis being ordered.

I'm not claiming these as proof of cause, but they are seem specific to the 180hp engine which is the one developing the problems. It would be odd to ignore them.

 

[veg_frenzy]

Got the results of my oil analysis today. Not good! Very high levels of Iron, Aluminium and Silicon. No oil usage as yet. I spoke to the guy at Millers about it. He said he had done a lot of these samples for 180 T5s over the past month or two and that only 2 or 3 had been within acceptable limits. Most, like mine were miles above!

All rather worrying! It seems probable that nearly everyone with the 180 engine is likely to find they have high levels of Fe, Al and Si if they get their oil tested. From there is seems fairly inevitable that at some point it will turn into high oil usage and then engine replacement! The mileage at which it happens seems to vary quite a lot but the end result seems pretty consistent i.e. new engine! Just have to hope the good work from the guys on the Facebook forum / t5-life.com spurs VW into some sort of action before it happens!

View attachment 19671

How many miles you done Mark? That level of Al is alarming.

 

[Spartan]

All very correct and hard to argue with, except you are ignoring the other data available : photos showing the worn bores and congested piston rings, the decayed internals of the egr cooler and the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis being ordered.

I'm not claiming these as proof of cause, but they are seem specific to the 180hp engine which is the one developing the problems. It would be odd to ignore them.

In case my position needs clarifying:

• "photos showing showing the worn bores and congested piston rings" would actually confirm what was suggested in my last post
• "the decayed internals of the egr cooler" is interesting (and worrying!); it is also a possible source of "the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis" but it is not the only source - there are, of course, many other sources for those elements (as contaminants) in the oil: silicon has already been mentioned in a previous post; aluminium (especially when alloyed) is a very common material for engine component manufacture (in this context, two obvious examples could be the cylinder head and pistons).

Based on the posts I've already made to this thread, I think it's unfair to just suggest I'm ignoring anything; my purpose (apparently failed) was to inform and broaden discussion.

 

[markh]

How many miles you done Mark? That level of Al is alarming.

I've done 47,650 miles in total and just over 11,500 on that oil.

As you say, it's rather alarming but the guy at Millers said that most of the samples tested were high or very high, dependent on mileage since the last oil change (and probably total mileage). Based on what he was saying, I would not be surprised if most people with the 180 would find they have high levels of these contaminants if they got their oil tested.

 

[markh]

"the decayed internals of the egr cooler" is interesting (and worrying!); it is also a possible source of "the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis" but it is not the only source - there are, of course, many other sources for those elements (as contaminants) in the oil: silicon has already been mentioned in a previous post; aluminium (especially when alloyed) is a very common material for engine component manufacture (in this context, two obvious examples could be the cylinder head and pistons).

I can understand that there are plenty of sources for the aluminium, but where else could the Silicon be coming from? It's usually just trace amounts in oil. Apologies if I couldn't find a previous explanation in the thread.

 

[Spartan]

I can understand that there are plenty of sources for the aluminium, but where else could the Silicon be coming from? It's usually just trace amounts in oil. Apologies if I couldn't find a previous explanation in the thread.

Absolutely no need to apologise - I don't think the explanation is in this thread.

As regards the possible source of the silicon, the first line of the article I linked in a previous post states:

"After oxygen, silicon is the most abundant element in the earth's crust"

The rest of the article goes into (a lot) more detail but, simply put, silicon is the major constituent of "dirt & dust" and some ingress to engine is inevitable.

There is one very interesting footnote to that article which could be relevant in this case:

"Piston torching. This is a rare occurrence but if a piston is torched by a misdirected or badly timed spray from an injector nozzle, silicon is released from the piston itself and all the wear rates will be increased (silicon is alloyed to aluminium to reduce its rate of expansion.)"

Notice the mention of aluminium here too! I'm not suggesting (again, trying to avoid speculation) that this is anything to do with this issue but it is an (another) example of how oil contamination could arise.

 

[2into1]

In case my position needs clarifying:

• "photos showing showing the worn bores and congested piston rings" would actually confirm what was suggested in my last post
• "the decayed internals of the egr cooler" is interesting (and worrying!); it is also a possible source of "the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis" but it is not the only source - there are, of course, many other sources for those elements (as contaminants) in the oil: silicon has already been mentioned in a previous post; aluminium (especially when alloyed) is a very common material for engine component manufacture (in this context, two obvious examples could be the cylinder head and pistons).

Based on the posts I've already made to this thread, I think it's unfair to just suggest I'm ignoring anything; my purpose (apparently failed) was to inform and broaden discussion.

Yes clearly the aluminium could come from the pistons, and the silica from dust, but those apply to all engines and all expected oil samples. My point (and criticism) is you are looking at generic engine wear, where the issue isn't generic, and specifically seems linked to an engine which uses a particular type of egr cooler construction, that has proven to be disintegrating (sometimes), has been upgraded several times (/D etc).
Your points aren't incorrect, they are just looking at a generic situation, where this problem is specific.

 

[Spartan]

Yes clearly the aluminium could come from the pistons, and the silica from dust, but those apply to all engines and all expected oil samples. My point (and criticism) is you are looking at generic engine wear, where the issue isn't generic, and specifically seems linked to an engine which uses a particular type of egr cooler construction, that has proven to be disintegrating (sometimes), has been upgraded several times (/D etc).
Your points aren't incorrect, they are just looking at a generic situation, where this problem is specific.

I understand your point - the problem does appear to be specific to the CFCA engine. However, I would defend the "generic" reference/criticism you make.

Above, I gave a general description of 'normal' engine oil consumption for context/information but it was clearly not my intention to imply that as the cause of this issue (I mentioned "engine oil consumption of this type can be very small"). In vehicles affected by this issue, engine oil consumption is axiomatically 'abnormal' (not "small").

You mention the EGR cooler and I can understand the temptation for naming it as the "smoking gun" - it could be the root cause of the issue. That could be convenient (kinda!) too - changing this single component could, in a 'phrophylactic' way, stop the issue occurring if that was the case. Without wanting to appear patronising, simple answers to complex problems are 'tidy' - nice-and-easy to understand or 'point at'.

However, it's difficult to reconcile that 'simple' answer with the apparent fact that not all CFCA vehicles are affected (you could say "yet" I suppose). Also, it has been 'stated' (speculated on other forums) that the similarly engined VW Amarok is not affected by this issue because it has a different design of EGR cooler but, if you do some research (as I have done), you might find that this is simply not the case: some VW Amarok vehicles with the same CFCA engine but different EGR cooler have apparently suffered from similar oil consumption issues ...

I would not be at all surprised if the EGR system is part of the problem but I suspect that, rather than having a single root cause, it's possible we have a "perfect storm" here - a unique combination of multiple causes leading to a specific problem for some vehicles. If that is the case then it might explain why VW have not been very forthcoming on this issue - they probably don't really know what's going on either (and, has already been suggested, in the bigger scheme of things they might not care that much)! Now you've got me speculating but would that really be so surprising?

 

[Spartan]

Hopefully last post on this subject by me today. Just to say, I'm certainly not trying to be controversial or contradictory - apologies if I've created that impression or offended anybody.

Anyway, just to show that this is not an isolated issue, take a look at this article from 'across the pond' if you have time. This issue is apparently not 'new' news or restricted to VW:

Excessive oil consumption isn't normal - Automakers say adding oil between scheduled changes is acceptable. It's not.

 

[WelshGas]

All very correct and hard to argue with, except you are ignoring the other data available : photos showing the worn bores and congested piston rings, the decayed internals of the egr cooler and the high Al and Si contents of all the analysis being ordered.

I'm not claiming these as proof of cause, but they are seem specific to the 180hp engine which is the one developing the problems. It would be odd to ignore them.

1 EGR cooler.
1 engine.
And the presumption is ALL the engines will fail, which is not substantiated.

Has anyone done Oil testing on any other engines, not 180? Has anyone done any Oil testing on high mileage 180 engines?, or Oil testing on other VW vehicles using the same base engine?

Also I would be very, very surprised if the CFCA engine had a very specific EGR system that only it used. Nowadays many parts are used across a range of engines and vehicle manufacturers especially if their function is controlled by engine management systems which can then adjust their function on differing engines etc:.

Once again I'm not denying some of these engines have a problem just that there is no Class 1 evidence as to the cause as yet. Just Speculation.

 

[briwy]

I agree in principle with what has been said in the previous posts and would just add that the EGR valve is obviously not the only difference between the engines. Turbos for one. As the 180 had two there is twice the opportunity for oil to get into the combustion chambers due to failing oil seals in the turbos. I keep banging on about letting the engine run after usage to minimise these problems and imo the stop start is a culprit here.
I remain unconvinced that the EGR is at fault. No definitive info yet to prove it.
Silicon, agree dust etc in the air, we have K&N filters on all our vehicles. Not only better airflow but unquestionably better filtration.

 

[craigs902]

Go to www.t5-life.com and you will see pictures of a failed EGR internals, and bore scoring because of the failed EGR.

We have over 400 members on the FB and growing fast so have now set up a dedicated web page to discuss and keep track of this situation.


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[WelshGas]

Go to www.t5-life.com and you will see pictures of a failed EGR internals, and bore scoring because of the failed EGR.

We have over 400 members on the FB and growing fast so have now set up a dedicated web page to discuss and keep track of this situation.


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You have pictures of 1 EGR and 1 Engine and 400 members of the Facebook group but NOT 400 members who have the same problem with their engine. Evidence not Supposition is what is needed. The fact you have a Facebook group and now a Forum is NOT evidence.

 

[craigs902]

Yes, there are 1000's of van owners that own a CFCA T5, but where do you suggest these van owners around the world yes around the world that have the same problem as this is happening in vans in Adelaide to the USA and in the UK. come together. I bet ya for every 1 person that has looked for answers for what is happen, there are 10 people who just accept what has happened and just fork out hard earned cash to VW to fix something that just should not be happening in the first place.

Do you expect VW to come out and say "sorry fellas we have made a bit of an error with the CFCA, sorry about that here ya go here's a new engine" or even help van owners out with an explanation. I would hold my breath. The poor buggers that have had problems have had to fork out 1000's of dollars for something that should just not be happening.

So until VW come out with the exact cause of why these engines are failing we'll just have to look at what is happening to them now and the 100's of vans that have been affected in the exact same way and come to our own conclusion.

It's funny though as soon as block off the EGR and DPF and do a remap all the problems seem to disappear, funny that no more elevated high metal wear in the motor..... hmmmm I wonder why.


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[Spartan]

Any initiative to bring owners of affected vehicles together to discuss and hopefully redress this issue is commendable and I recognise and applaud the efforts of those who have created/administer and participate in forums like this (and others), the FB group and new website.

However, stating things like this is really not helpful:

...

It's funny though as soon as block off the EGR and DPF and do a remap all the problems seem to disappear, funny that no more elevated high metal wear in the motor..... hmmmm I wonder why.

No one thinks it's "funny" of course.

You bundle together making changes to 3 different things - EGR, DPF, (re)map - any one of which taken singly could (probably would!) make 'some difference to something' and then imply that (together?) they are responsible for "no more elevated high metal wear in the motor". You don't assert this as fact, you "wonder" and I'm not surprised.

Please, let's have a bit more objective evidence and a bit less assumption! I don't have a problem with speculation/conjecture/guesswork/clairvoyance when it's clearly stated as that. What I do have a problem with is that, when it's disseminated/repeated umpteen times, it somehow appears to become 'fact' or 'received wisdom'.

 

[WelshGas]

It's funny though as soon as block off the EGR and DPF and do a remap all the problems seem to disappear, funny that no more elevated high metal wear in the motor..... hmmmm I wonder why.


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I wonder why as well. The DPF is downstream from the engine, so can have nothing to do with the problem and by disabling the EGR and DPF and reprogramming the EMS you are basically turning your vehicle into an environmental hazard, maybe not to yourself but to others. Good one.
And of the 1000's of owners with a CFCA engine , if only 1:10 are on the Facebook site with this actual oil consumption problem then, seeing as less than 100% of Facebook members have the problem then we are looking at between 2000 and 4000 affected engines worldwide, and in fact following my reading of the group, closer to 2000 engines worldwide, out of how many engines worldwide?

I know you are unhappy with your situation, but please be objective for everyone's sake.
Have you, or anyone, discussed this matter with someone who is knowledgeable about engine design and function?

 

[WelshGas]

This is the engine you are referring to, I believe, and as you will see it is used in many other vehicles.

 

[jts46]

found this on another VW california facebook page
https://honestaboutcars.com/2016/10/25/manufacturing-defects-on-t5-and-a5/