V50 T5 Oil Light

[alexstanleyv50]

Ok, so my 54 plate petrol T5 has an interesting problem. A week or so ago my oil light came on so I checked the oil condition and level and it did need changing but the level was good. The car had developed a nice tappet noise between 2000 to 2500 rpm (but at no other rpm).

On the ramps she went and I changed the oil and filter (what a pain in the backside getting to that is!). The old oil and filter didn't look overly dirty.

New filter on and in goes the oil. Fire her up and voila! No more noisy tappet and the oil light wouldn't come on... until this morning (two days later).

So the noisy tappet is back and the oil light comes and goes.

Now, the oil light comes on only under the following conditions but not always:

When coming to a stop and the revs drop to idle the light comes on. If I tap the throttle it goes off. If I leave it idling it goes off after say 5 seconds ish.

This happens more often when coming to a stop or very slow manoeuvring (2-3mph) whilst cornering right.

Please don't jump on and tell me to NOT DRIVE the car. I know what damage could be done and I aint daft. You try not driving your only car to work.

I am not convinced that this is a pump issue. I am less convinced it is an electronic issue (ie sensors) and I am slightly more convinced its the seals on the pick up pipes in the sump.

Any help?

[alexstanleyv50]

How's this for a bit of interesting reading from Volvo's manual. It says about the oil pressure light in the manual that:

"After hard driving, the light may come on occasionally when the engine is idling. This is normal, provided it goes off when the engine speed is increased."

Now I don't hammer the car (much) but it does go off when revs pick up. Hummm interesting....

[gswede]

Could be the oil pick up having come loose..

[alexstanleyv50]

That was my thought.

Having searched around and stuck my head under the bonnet it looks like I have the o-ring issue.

I have small bubbles in the oil when checking at idle and the oil light does not come on whilst the engine is being used normally.

So its a call to the Volvo stealers at Chesterfield and my local inde to see what size dent its going to put in my pocket. Would love to do this myself but a hand injury means I'm stuffed when it comes to gripping things.

Anyone have a rough idea of cost? From what I can see its looking around £300. Bung another couple of £100's on there for stealership but to be honest I want this doing properly.

The joys of owning a Volvo.....

[alexstanleyv50]

Ok, so last week I attempted removing the sump to replace all the O Rings. However, I could not for the life of me get the A/C compressor belts off so booked her into the garage.

They had it for the day and stripped it down to find that all the O Rings were in a poor state. On top of that, HALF of the oil pick up O Ring that seals the pipe to the pump had broken off and was nowhere to be found! We hope it has been macerated by the pump....

Anyway, one week on and my noisy tappet is no more, and the oil light is off! It appears the sump had been off with a previous owner to repair a crack. The repair looked like the typical dealer fix - apoxy resin - but they had not used the standard liquid gasket when refitting. Instead they had used a putty mix.

My mechanic said there was no way the sump had been torqued up correctly as the putty was way too thick and probably sped up the destruction of the O Rings.

My guess is now that as our T5 V50's start getting passed the 10 year/100k miles we may be seeing a lot more of this issue. So anyone with this problem expect to pay around £60 for the O Rings (get them from FRF Swansea - call Ruffe (Simon) and quote C3 for discount), and around 5 hours labour (so long as everything comes off OK).

Whatever you do, do not listen to the dealers - they will want to replace your oil pump. My mechanic (a Volvo Master Technician) and my Granddad (Worked for the police force on their T5's) said that the only time they found an oil pump fail was when it was removed i.e. the process of removing them damaged them.

Just for reference my symptoms were:
Low oil pressure warning light at idle.
Noisy tappet.
NO oil light when engine under normal load/hard acceleration.
NO oil leaks.

[Welton]

I'm not sure I understand? I've never heard of a car having the sump off to replace O-rings, can you describe what this problem is please? I'm concerned about my car now but then the sump has never been touched.

You're saying that the O-ring which seals the oil pickup/strainer perished - this will draw air into the oil I think (or un-strained oil perhaps?) but this is the first I've heard of it being a potential issue on the T5 so obviously very interested.

[KrissV50]

On the issue with the cracked sump did you get it repaired or replaced?

I bought my V50 almost 2years ago (different engine, mine is 2.0D) When I checked under the engine it was nice and clean and no oil leaks.
I did notice a black coating on the front face of the sump when changing the oil but it all looked fine and I thought it was normal, but about two months ago I noticed a little patch of oil where I park the car and when I checked under the car the black coating had a crack in it and oil was very slowly oozing out.
I sourced a second had sump on the net for £70 and replaced the old one.
On close examination of the old sump a very small crack could be seen on the inside so if your sump was repaired keep an eye on it.

[alexstanleyv50]

Originally Posted by Welton

I'm not sure I understand? I've never heard of a car having the sump off to replace O-rings, can you describe what this problem is please? I'm concerned about my car now but then the sump has never been touched.

You're saying that the O-ring which seals the oil pickup/strainer perished - this will draw air into the oil I think (or un-strained oil perhaps?) but this is the first I've heard of it being a potential issue on the T5 so obviously very interested.

Hi Welton,

Basically I kept getting the oil pressure warning light illuminating at idle. Lots of people with older versions of this 5 pot engine were pointing fingers at the O Rings in the sump having perished.

In detail there are several O Rings. The first is a square edged O Ring that seals the oil pick up pipe to the oil pump. This was the main cause of my issue as half of it had broken off and is assumed to have been macerated by the pump.

There is another square edged O Ring that seals where the dip stick tube enters the sump. Again this was damaged, most likely from the dip stick begin used.

We then have two (about an inch in diameter) O Rings that seal two pipes that form part of the sump and block. These had partially "popped" in. There are another few smaller O Rings within the sump but I'm unsure where they live as I didn't do the work.

The final two form the seal between the sump and the oil cooler (the little black box on the back of the sump when you get under the car). These were in relatively good condition.

The reason this may become an issue is that my V50 is now 10 years old and has clocked 120k miles. So others whose engines are getting to a similar age could start experiencing the same issue.

The main reason I have put this info out there is to act as a pre-emptive strike. ALL of the dealers I spoke with wanted to replace the oil pump, because they would normally be dealing with warranty covered cars, but once our warrenties run out we tend to avoid dealers. It was the independent Volvo garages and two independent Volvo master technicians who told me "Volvo oil pumps are only damaged when they are removed, as the process of removal damages them, this means the dealers always think they have found the problem". That was from my graddad who spent 40 years repairing Volvo T5's for South Yorkshire Traffic Police.

As I said, this is a possible "positive maintenance" issue that if, say your car has done over 100k and is over 10 years old it may be prudent to replace the oil seals in the sump, just in case the do go. I fear that a bit of the oil pick up O Ring may have worked it's way into one of the galleries which could cause me more issues down the line, but I'm hoping its just been eaten by the pump.

Ultimately, you now know that when and if you ever start getting the oil pressure warning light at IDLE ONLY you can safely assume that the above mentioned O Rings are more likely to blame than a faulty oil pump, plus you're only looking at about £300 for a competent mechanic to fix it.

I don't want to scaremonger, just educate for the just incases!

[alexstanleyv50]

Originally Posted by KrissV50

On the issue with the cracked sump did you get it repaired or replaced?

I bought my V50 almost 2years ago (different engine, mine is 2.0D) When I checked under the engine it was nice and clean and no oil leaks.
I did notice a black coating on the front face of the sump when changing the oil but it all looked fine and I thought it was normal, but about two months ago I noticed a little patch of oil where I park the car and when I checked under the car the black coating had a crack in it and oil was very slowly oozing out.
I sourced a second had sump on the net for £70 and replaced the old one.
On close examination of the old sump a very small crack could be seen on the inside so if your sump was repaired keep an eye on it.

Hi KrissV50,

No the sump had been like that when I bought it. It appears it took a knock and it was cracked by a previous owner. I have read around that several people found that when under warranty the dealers used an apoxy resin to repair the sump.

However, the liquid gasket that is supposed to be used is pink and very thin. When my mechanic took the sump off it had a thick black putty gasket, so this that the reckoned the sump could not have been torqued up enough, thus speeding up the O Ring damage.

The repair to the sump is a really good job, and my mechanic said that he couldn't have done better and was more than happy to re-use instead of replace. But it's something I will keep an eye on as I hope that I don't have to have the sump off ever again.......

[Welton]

Perhaps you've had other unfortunate faults leading to the O-ring failure: firstly the sump has been compromised by hitting something and has subsequently been removed/refitted (possibly a couple of times too) and secondly if your car had suffered the oil breather diaphragm failure at some point and wasn't attended to quickly it could have subjected the O rings to excessive pressures and dislodging them?

I wonder also if someone had added an oil treatment which the O rings took a dislike to, some kind of flushing agent that was perhaps left in too long or some other 'magic treatment' which did more harm than good.

You've had this car a few months? me thinks you've inherited a problem the previous owner got tired of, possible 'fixed' for the sale by increasing the oil thickness (or an additive) to raise the pressure enough to keep the warning light off whereas the real issue was a dislodged O ring after the sump had been 'repaired'.

I hope it'll be fine now, I'm sure it will and treat it to good Oil, I use Silkolene/Fhuchs Race oil it's brilliant stuff.