Low oil level after 2500 miles?

[jordan7050]

I changed the oil in my gti roughly 2500 miles ago (start of august). At the time i put 4.7 litres in.

Today i had a 200 mile drive and had no problems but tonight I jumped in the car to get something from tescos and the low oil level light is on,is it common for the oil level to drop so quickly? I checked the oil level and it's bang on the low level.

I plan to top it up tomorrow and when I go to service it again I'll drop the sump and check the condition of the pick up.

Is this a common thing? Is there anything I should check in particular before topping the oil up?

Thanks

[Bazgti]

My Mk5 could/would go through a litre every 800/1000miles. It a common thing apparently. It seemed to get better as the miles clocked up.

[strongbow]

mines the same 2500 miles and light on. put 1/4 litre in and it was to much , hard to judge,but from what ive heard this is pretty good for burning oil. think the sensor kicks in a bit to early,but that's what its there for.

[dan930]

My old ed30 goes through a litre in every 2-3k

[jordan7050]

Cheers I bought another 5 litres and will top up when needed,was worried it was burning too much oil but the manual says 1 litre in 1000 miles is expected!

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

[ducman77]

Cheers I bought another 5 litres and will top up when needed,was worried it was burning too much oil but the manual says 1 litre in 1000 miles is expected!

The high oil consumption of some Mk5 GTI FSI engines is a well known problem. If you do a Google search you'll get loads of hits. The Americans even managed to get a recall out of it.

My wife's 07 Model GTI uses just over one litre every 1000 miles. I first bought the car in 2011 and I was totally freaked out by it. I was sure the guy who sold it to me had ripped me off. I did loads of research and quickly found out how common an issue it is with these cars.

I replaced the PCV valve in an attempt to improve it. No luck.

We've driven the car for 25K miles now. I just check it religiously every two weeks with a reminder on my phone. It always uses some oil. Pretty much always in line with the mileage driven in the preceding two weeks.

I think it's totally disingenuous of VW to say it's "normal" for the engine to consume 1ltr per 1k miles. Following that logic it would be normal to give the car 12 litres of oil between services, 12 litres of oil annually, 2 or 3 litres on a drive to the continent. Etc, etc. What a load of crap.

There is a problem with some of the FSI engines in that they burn an unacceptable amount of oil. End of.

There are loads of theories as to why. You'll find them all on Google. My favourite is poor bedding in of the piston rings during the running in period of the engine as I've tried all the other common "solutions" to no avail.

I was so cross and worried about it when I first bought the car I wanted to sell it. However, four years and 25,000 miles later I still adore the car! As long as it's regularly topped, up the oil thing seems to be a non issue.

One word of warning, a friend of mine who drives an Audi with the same engine fitted, drove his briefly with the oil light on and killed his engine stone dead. I never, ever wait for the light. I always check it every two weeks or sooner depending on mileage.

Anyways....rant over....

Moral of the story is. Keep her topped up and all will be well

[Panthera]

My 57 plate GTi uses oil as described above.    I do have one question though, how much oil to put in at varying levels on the did stick. I always worried of over fulling which i believe to be worse than low oil level.  Cheers

[Beej]

I don't think it's unreasonable to use oil every few thousand miles, all red top Honda vtecs use around the same, and so do amg engine mercs, and in their handbooks, both state that 1ltr per 1000 miles is within tolerance. Mine also uses around a litre to every 1000-2000 miles, I just keep an eye on it

[Chris92]

My 57 plate GTi uses oil as described above.    I do have one question though, how much oil to put in at varying levels on the did stick. I always worried of over fulling which i believe to be worse than low oil level.  Cheers

I think to fill from min to max on the dip stick is one litre, wouldn't worry too much if you over fill it a tiny bit as it'll get used anyways.

[GTIEagles]

Mine so far has been brilliant I have owned the car since 100k and in that time at about 106k I had to top it up by 500ml so that's about 1lt every 12k which is pretty good in my opinion especially as I apparently have the troublesome AXX engine

[xjay1337]

My AXX barely used any oil as well. Might do half a liter between services

[pudding]

My old ed30 goes through a litre in every 2-3k

Same. The K04 engine isn't as thirsty.  Better pistons and rings I believe.

[GTIEagles]

I know the AXX apparently has forged Pistons, I wonder if that has anything to do with it?

[pudding]

Wouldn't have thought so as VW would use Mahle, the best piston makers in the world.  They're a bit looser in the bores than cast pistons, but I've never heard piston slap in a TFSI motor from cold, which is always a sign of sloppy bore clearances.