How long can an engine run without oil?

[Al]

You'll be fine. As was pointed out do an oil analysis.

 

[Grossomotto]

I once took my old beater Honda Civic to Jiffy Lube. When they pulled the drain plug, about 1/2 pint of oil dribbled out!

I doubt you did any damage.

 

[Rickey]

Ouch! If oilpans could talk. Remember that on most modern automobiles operation of the fuel pump is linked to oil pressure. No oil pressure and the fuel pump quits. If that's the case with your vehicle that would be one more reason to believe everything is OK. Good Luck.

 

[GatorJ]

If you had only added Prolong Engine Treatment this wouldn't even be an issue. Could have even dumped a bucket of sand down the oil filler opening and it would still be running. (Seriously, hope everything is OK, sounds like it should be.)

 

[Jerry]

In college we had a auto club and to raise some money we had a bet setup to guess how long it would take for a corvair motor to blow up without any oil in it. One kid donated a ratty car. Well all the bets were under 10 minutes... thing ran for 15+ min, 3-4K rpm. People lost interest in it since there was not going to be any winner and it was shut off. They put oil in it and it was driven off the junk yard. I also guess the buzz from the beer keg was wearing off too.

 

[TC]

Years ago a mechanic friend of mine intentionally wanted to seize a Datsun engine by running it without oil (a long story). Took over 15 minutes, a lot longer than he expected. As a 16 yr old kid I inadverdently backed my Mom's '70 Mercury wagon off the ramps without oil while doing a lube job, probably about 20 seconds or so. No obvious harm at all. And through cumulative dry starts over an engine's life, it essentially runs many minutes without oil.

 

[Don Stevens]

Gator beat me to it....Remember Prolong advertsising about 5 -6 years ago where they drained the oil out of a prolong equipped car and drove it all over town? We'll Consumer rports tried the same trick on two identical 4.3 Chevy taxi's. Both engines seized with in a minute of each other after 14 minutes.

So the point is, based on this and other "no oil" experiences, mosy engine will probably run 10-15 minutes with no oil. If you ran yours one minute and the oil was draining out, forget about it. Damage will likely be imperceptable.

Don

 

[Steve S]

quote:

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Originally posted by Steve S:
If the oil pan has to be removed you can pull one of the main bearing caps off for a look at the bearing. probably no problem. The main and connecting rod berings Will take the damage.

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Don't have to do an oil anaylsis.or leakdown test all inspection can be done when the pan is changed.

 

[brianl703]

When the oil pump in my 1988 Mustang 5.0 died (@140K miles or so), it probably ran for one or two minutes with no oil pressure.

Oil pump was replaced and the engine shows no signs that it ever had been run without oil pressure. Didn't start consuming any more oil than it already was. Didn't start smoking. Didn't lose any power or gas mileage.

When the oil pump died it was filled with Rotella-T 15W40, maybe that helped prevent damage??

 

[Dr. T]

And you guys are worried about cold starts??

I agree with the observations, you should be completely fine PaJohn.....

 

[Schmoe]

Screw Prolong....he probably had Slick 50 in it!

 

[PaJohn]

Thanks everyone. Just got done putting evreything back together and it seems fine, although it did chatter a lot for the first 5-10 seconds. Scared the heck out of me, but it quited right down after the oil started flowing.