Burning oil at steep inclines

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Cadendoo22
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My tercel:: 1983 Toyota tercel sr5 4wd

Burning oil at steep inclines

Post by Cadendoo22 »

I was off roading the other day and came to a steep hill. It started off great and 4 low kept me going up there no problem but as it got steeper my engine started to sputter and a ton of blueish smoke came out of the exhaust. I stopped on the hill and the engine calmed down and the smoke went away. My thoughts are oil from the oil pan sloshing onto the pistons? Is this normal for tercels, and if it is can I do anything to fix it?
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Petros
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My tercel:: '84 Tercel4wd w/extensive mods
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Re: Burning oil at steep inclines

Post by Petros »

this is normal for a production engines, the sump is designed to collect and contain the oil at normal road type angles. if you have your oil topped up, or are a little over full, at steep angles the crank could strike the surface of the soil, and slosh it up all over the cylinders where it overloads the oil control rings. this can also happen if you over fill your crankcase too much, when you not even on a hill.

There are several ways this is dealt with on race vehicles and serious off road vehicles. These are to build a custom deep oil pan that has higher storage volume, and a "windage" tray (a splash guard or shield that separates the sump from the crank case), or to go to a dry sump oil system. Both are to prevent momentary oil starvation at high angles or high g turns. Either option means removing the oil pan and rebuilding it.

it is easier to make a deeper pan, with built in baffles in the sump (it reduces the amount the oil "sloshes" around), and adding a windage tray. the 4age has a windage tray as stock, you can fit one of those into your 4a/3a engine (it goes in between the oil pan and the bottom of the engine block), but you can also fabricate one to fit your engine. it is just a pan that separates the crank case from the oil sump, with drain holes strategically placed to allow the returning oil to drain back into the sump, but it prevents oil from sloshing up the sides of the crankcase.

A dry sump oil pan and system is a superior but much more costly (and it is more complex, so higher risk of a malfunction). it requires adding an external scavenger pump to collect the oil from the drain pan, pump into a storage tank, and than the tank feeds the oil pump to pressurize the lubrication system. it also lends itself to having a much higher engine oil storage capacity, adding more or larger oil filters, and an oil cooler, if you think it is necessary. Oil coolers are not really necessary for most driving, only high performance driving where the engine is always at high load and high rpm.

Other than a 4age windage tray, there would be no kits or custom parts or oil pans to fit the Tercel4wd available. so if you do this you are on your own. though likely you can find examples of what you want for other cars on the internet/youtube, and you can fabricate it yourself, if that is the way you want to go.

good luck.
'87 Tercel 4wd SR5 (current engine swap project)
'84 Tercel 4wd (daily driver, with on going mods)
'92 Mazda MPV 4wd (wife's daily driver)
'85 Tercel 4wd DLX auto(daughter's daily driver)
'01 Honda Civic (other daughter's daily driver)
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Cadendoo22
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Posts: 29
Joined: Sat Sep 25, 2021 11:57 pm
My tercel:: 1983 Toyota tercel sr5 4wd

Re: Burning oil at steep inclines

Post by Cadendoo22 »

Petros wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 6:07 pm this is normal for a production engines, the sump is designed to collect and contain the oil at normal road type angles. if you have your oil topped up, or are a little over full, at steep angles the crank could strike the surface of the soil, and slosh it up all over the cylinders where it overloads the oil control rings. this can also happen if you over fill your crankcase too much, when you not even on a hill.

There are several ways this is dealt with on race vehicles and serious off road vehicles. These are to build a custom deep oil pan that has higher storage volume, and a "windage" tray (a splash guard or shield that separates the sump from the crank case), or to go to a dry sump oil system. Both are to prevent momentary oil starvation at high angles or high g turns. Either option means removing the oil pan and rebuilding it.

it is easier to make a deeper pan, with built in baffles in the sump (it reduces the amount the oil "sloshes" around), and adding a windage tray. the 4age has a windage tray as stock, you can fit one of those into your 4a/3a engine (it goes in between the oil pan and the bottom of the engine block), but you can also fabricate one to fit your engine. it is just a pan that separates the crank case from the oil sump, with drain holes strategically placed to allow the returning oil to drain back into the sump, but it prevents oil from sloshing up the sides of the crankcase.

A dry sump oil pan and system is a superior but much more costly (and it is more complex, so higher risk of a malfunction). it requires adding an external scavenger pump to collect the oil from the drain pan, pump into a storage tank, and than the tank feeds the oil pump to pressurize the lubrication system. it also lends itself to having a much higher engine oil storage capacity, adding more or larger oil filters, and an oil cooler, if you think it is necessary. Oil coolers are not really necessary for most driving, only high performance driving where the engine is always at high load and high rpm.

Other than a 4age windage tray, there would be no kits or custom parts or oil pans to fit the Tercel4wd available. so if you do this you are on your own. though likely you can find examples of what you want for other cars on the internet/youtube, and you can fabricate it yourself, if that is the way you want to go.

good luck.
Thanks a bunch for the info, might look into the windage tray. I also considered a baffle in the pan to reduce sloshing, either way it's not a huge deal most of the time. On a side note at what point do you think an oil cooler is necessary.
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Petros
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Re: Burning oil at steep inclines

Post by Petros »

Cadendoo22 wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 10:04 pm On a side note at what point do you think an oil cooler is necessary.
the oil temp is directly tied to the engine rpm. in contrast to the cooling load on the radiator, that is directly tied to engine loading, or how close to full throttle you are. in most daily driving you are seldom near red line on the tach, even if you do red-line the engine regularly (with only 63 hp, that is not unusual when pulling out into traffic, etc.), but your average RPM in city driving is not very high. the best way to know is to add an oil temperature gauge (not water temp and not oil pressure, but oil temperature), usually the sender gets mounted in the oil pan. and than watch it regularly as you drive in different conditions.

Many years ago in collage I was setting up an old volvo 122s for rally cross, I had entered a few (never did very well), but being a collage student I did have a lot of money to make it into a real race car. I bought most of the stuff I installed used at race car swap meets (a fun place to buy performance parts), and I welded on a oil temp sender boss on the oil pan when I had the engine apart, and installed an oil temp gauge i bought used. I was going to install an engine oil cooler, but I drove it daily in all kinds of conditions, including across the California desert on gravel roads. the oil temp never even got to 200 deg, most of the time it was between 170-190 deg F. this is not even hot enough for normal operating temperature (200-210 deg F was considered ideal, prevents the formation of oil sludge). I drove it hard most of the time, and never had the need for an oil cooler. one time the temperature crept up on a long up hill run at high rpm out in the desert, but it was not there long enough to need a cooler even than, it came right back down after I was over the top of the hill. If I was actually racing it, where I would keep the rpm up high, near red line at full throttle the whole time, I might need one. it would be rather rare to ever need one for street driving, even if you break the law and street race it. the speeds, rpms and loading are never high for very long on a street car, even a high performance one (that would not be a tercel with a 3ac engine either).

so not likely you would need it unless you are building a full time racing car. but the way to know for certain would be to install an oil temperature gauge and just keep an eye on it as you drive in various conditions. it is rather interesting to get both water temp, oil pressure, and oil temp gauges with more graduations on them, to watch what each one does under various driving conditions. it is far cheaper to install a good oil temp gauge and monitor your oil temp, than to actually install a quality oil cooler, plumbing, fittings, etc. no reason to do it unless you know you actually need it.

good luck.
'87 Tercel 4wd SR5 (current engine swap project)
'84 Tercel 4wd (daily driver, with on going mods)
'92 Mazda MPV 4wd (wife's daily driver)
'85 Tercel 4wd DLX auto(daughter's daily driver)
'01 Honda Civic (other daughter's daily driver)
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