Low Oil Poll with Break-in Data

Does your car burn oil?


  • Total voters
    181

Loco38SUP

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After seeing all the recent chatter about the 2021’s burning excessive oil lets see if we can find any correlation with engine break-in method.

* Update * For the people that voted “Yes” please respond with your production date and I will compile the data and add it here. Thanks

Production Dates with Excessive Oil Consumption:

06/20, 1 reported
-RJM
Sponsored

 
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handsoffsam

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Thanks for this -- much better to establish the data rather than try to aggregate posts ;)

FWIW, I'm not sure I'd qualify as "excessive" but voted Yes since there has been some consumption.

Additional items FWIW..

Daily Driver: Yes
Time since oil change: 3000 miles (verified "max" at fill up since I did it)
Driving style: Hard but also cruising 55 miles a day
Track time: ~3 hours consecutively

IMG_4037.jpg
 

autopc25

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After seeing all the recent chatter about the 2021’s burning excessive oil lets see if we can find any correlation with engine break-in method.

-RJM
Might be a good idea to keep track of build dates and/or VINs also. Hopefully it's not too widespread and can be tracked to specific VIN ranges.
 
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suicidaleggroll

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This is a good idea, thanks for posting this.

For those that are curious, all professional engine builders (at least every one that I've seen) recommend you break in the engine in the same way. You can google it and find numerous sources, but basically you NEED decent pressure and vacuum in the cylinders to push the rings into the hone on the cylinder wall so they can wear into each other and form a good seal. You have a limited amount of time for this, after a few hundred or a thousand miles, that hone is gone and break-in is done, even if the rings aren't seated yet. If the rings aren't seated well, that means excessive blow-by and excessive oil consumption. This means that during those first thousand miles, you want to bring the engine up to normal operating temp gently, and then you want to drive with varying load and RPM, including medium and some full throttle pulls, lots of engine braking, and minimal idling or cruising. You don't need to redline it, you just need some heavy throttle occasionally, you can do that while keeping the RPM below 5k pretty easily.

Now I'm sure many of you are asking why this is so different than the manufacturer's recommended break-in. The answer is simple IMO. Engineers don't just write the user's manual and push it out, it has to go through filters first, and two of those filters are PR and legal. WOT pulls on city streets are illegal, they can't tell you to do medium or full throttle pulls or they'll be faced with lawsuits when people inevitably get tickets or crash and try to use the "I was just doing what Toyota told me to do" excuse. They're also not going to tell you that you have to break in the engine on a closed-circuit track because that would be terrible PR. As a result, every car manufacturer that I've seen has the exact same drive-like-a-grandma verbiage for breaking in your engine, even though that goes against the advice of every engine builder I've ever spoken with or read posts/papers from.

Why does this seem to only affect 2021 models and not 2020? Unless it turns out there's some manufacturing defect, my best guess is it has to do with the drop in the compression ratio. This means two things: 1) getting the engine into boost during break-in is even more important on the 2021 than it was on the 2020, because we've lost a pretty significant amount of mechanical compression in the engine that would have been helping to boost cylinder pressures and seat the rings for us, and 2) the drop in compression slows spool, which means driving the same way in a 2021 as in a 2020 results in less boost, and with the lower compression that's even LESS cylinder pressure to help seat the rings. It's a double-whammy effect. With the 2021 you not only have to hit the gas harder to get to the same boost pressure at low RPM, you actually need to hit the gas even harder and get it to higher boost pressure in order to overcome the drop in the compression ratio and get back up to the same cylinder pressures as on the 2020. It's possible with how quickly the 2020 spooled and how much compression the engine was running, driving like a grandma actually was still enough to get the rings to seat well, but I don't think that's the case anymore with the 2021.

Just my $0.02

Here are some articles on engine break-in if anyone is interested on reading more:
https://www.enginelabs.com/news/dispelling-engine-break-in-myths-with-high-performance-academy/
https://www.autoweek.com/car-life/c...gine-is-all-about-bringing-surfaces-together/

There are lots of sources out there, they all pretty much say the same thing in my experience.
 

freeform911

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a91...Build date 6/20...
2500 miles...1qt added
Spirited driving
1 track day...4/5hrs on track

Not necessarily a by the manual break in but I also didn't dog on the car for the first 1300 miles...

Steve
 

Nocturnal LE

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-No issues with low oil, or any other problems
-2020 Launch Edition (not sure production date, but launch edition so obviously one of the first)
-Break in nice and easy, but also couldn't help a couple hard pulls to red line each time I drove it after the first couple hundred miles.
-First oil change after 1 year ~2000 miles
-I'm overseas 2 months, home 1 month at a time so driving schedule is... daily driven for 3 months a year (spirited). Driven 2x/week by my pops 4-5 months a year (I have to beg him to get on it a little bit while I'm gone), winter storage 4-5 months a year
-No track time yet.. May 30th!
 

Sigg

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This is a good idea, thanks for posting this.

For those that are curious, all professional engine builders (at least every one that I've seen) recommend you break in the engine in the same way. You can google it and find numerous sources, but basically you NEED decent pressure and vacuum in the cylinders to push the rings into the hone on the cylinder wall so they can wear into each other and form a good seal. You have a limited amount of time for this, after a few hundred or a thousand miles, that hone is gone and break-in is done, even if the rings aren't seated yet. If the rings aren't seated well, that means excessive blow-by and excessive oil consumption. This means that during those first thousand miles, you want to bring the engine up to normal operating temp gently, and then you want to drive with varying load and RPM, including medium and some full throttle pulls, lots of engine braking, and minimal idling or cruising. You don't need to redline it, you just need some heavy throttle occasionally, you can do that while keeping the RPM below 5k pretty easily.

Now I'm sure many of you are asking why this is so different than the manufacturer's recommended break-in. The answer is simple IMO. Engineers don't just write the user's manual and push it out, it has to go through filters first, and two of those filters are PR and legal. WOT pulls on city streets are illegal, they can't tell you to do medium or full throttle pulls or they'll be faced with lawsuits when people inevitably get tickets or crash and try to use the "I was just doing what Toyota told me to do" excuse. They're also not going to tell you that you have to break in the engine on a closed-circuit track because that would be terrible PR. As a result, every car manufacturer that I've seen has the exact same drive-like-a-grandma verbiage for breaking in your engine, even though that goes against the advice of every engine builder I've ever spoken with or read posts/papers from.

Why does this seem to only affect 2021 models and not 2020? Unless it turns out there's some manufacturing defect, my best guess is it has to do with the drop in the compression ratio. This means two things: 1) getting the engine into boost during break-in is even more important on the 2021 than it was on the 2020, because we've lost a pretty significant amount of mechanical compression in the engine that would have been helping to boost cylinder pressures and seat the rings for us, and 2) the drop in compression slows spool, which means driving the same way in a 2021 as in a 2020 results in less boost, and with the lower compression that's even LESS cylinder pressure to help seat the rings. It's a double-whammy effect. With the 2021 you not only have to hit the gas harder to get to the same boost pressure at low RPM, you actually need to hit the gas even harder and get it to higher boost pressure in order to overcome the drop in the compression ratio and get back up to the same cylinder pressures as on the 2020. It's possible with how quickly the 2020 spooled and how much compression the engine was running, driving like a grandma actually was still enough to get the rings to seat well, but I don't think that's the case anymore with the 2021.

Just my $0.02

Here are some articles on engine break-in if anyone is interested on reading more:
https://www.enginelabs.com/news/dispelling-engine-break-in-myths-with-high-performance-academy/
https://www.autoweek.com/car-life/c...gine-is-all-about-bringing-surfaces-together/

There are lots of sources out there, they
I dont know why people thinking an easy break in is good for the engine. You need the engine TO SEAL. I've broken in multiple motorcycles and now this supra and yeah. No problems with break in. Drive em hard enough to get the seal but don't gotta red line em. I feel like this is really obvious in the car and bike world but I guess not. Babying the car from the start could he a huge reason for oil Consumption. Lack of a proper seal is not a joke and you won't get that nice tight seal cruising around.
 
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Loco38SUP

Loco38SUP

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I think information about production date should be added to better narrow down the issue. Seeing how others doesn't have any issues, Do you guys think it could be a bad batch of motors?
Yes, good point. I’ve updated the original post to request production dates. I will compile the data and add it there. Should be interesting to see what production run they belong to.

-RJM
 

Dannyvandelft

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It's inconclusive. They will all burn oil to a degree. Question is how much oil in how many miles. A quart in 1000 miles, problem. A quart in 3000 miles, within spec. No matter what the "experts" on here and Facebook say.
 

Sereph102889

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2021, 3.0 B58. Every time I hop in the car it's almost exclusively in sport manual and I'm driving it spiritedly. Oil checked at 2,200 miles, no oil change done yet, and it's at the max fill line.
 
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Loco38SUP

Loco38SUP

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It's inconclusive. They will all burn oil to a degree. Question is how much oil in how many miles. A quart in 1000 miles, problem. A quart in 3000 miles, within spec. No matter what the "experts" on here and Facebook say.
Yes agree, the term “excessive” is subjective to a certain degree. I would say that even 1 quart every 3000 miles is excessive in my book for a brand new car.

Now my 2007 GTI, I add 1/2 a quart every time I fill up at the gas station. :doh:

-RJM
 

MKV2021

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Build Date: 10/20
Mileage: 1,900
Daily Driver: No, but driven fairly frequently
Time Since Oil Change: Still on factory fill; none added
Driving Style: Fairly normal, but it gets regular Italian tuneups
Track Use: None
Break-In Method: 95% by the book

I always follow a good warmup procedure whenever I drive; let it run 30 seconds or so, then drive easy for the first 10-15 minutes before I even consider giving it the beans. When I drive this car, I'm never in a hurry, so it's easy to do all this consistently. Voted in the poll accordingly.

20210403_151742.jpg
 

Retrocade

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I dont know why people thinking an easy break in is good for the engine. You need the engine TO SEAL. I've broken in multiple motorcycles and now this supra and yeah. No problems with break in. Drive em hard enough to get the seal but don't gotta red line em. I feel like this is really obvious in the car and bike world but I guess not. Babying the car from the start could he a huge reason for oil Consumption. Lack of a proper seal is not a joke and you won't get that nice tight seal cruising around.
well maybe because the two companies that built this car have almost 200 years of car building experience and have invested 100s of millions of dollars into research and Toyotas racing development is one of the worlds best and the two manufacturers are some of the top ranked cars for reliability and it is what they tell you to do with their cars? I mean IM just guessing. But yeah some guy on the internet knows more we should all listen to you.
 

Mk5upra

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Purchased: Oct 2019
Year: 2020
Break-in: picked it up in Iowa and drove it 4hrs on the hiway at 70-80mph. Nothing excessive until after 1000 miles. :dunno:
Mileage: 14050 now
Oil change: First free oil changed at 5600, second free oil change coming soon. :fear:
Motor Oil Type: Toyota Gazoo Racing 0w-20.
Driving habit: Daily Driver, heavy foot here and there.
Mods: BM3 Stage 1 tune at 1500 miles. Downpipe with BM3 stage 2 tune and hks adjustable around 6500 miles.

Haven't had any oil issues/consumption even with a heavy foot driving after 1000 miles. It has always been storage during winter seasons with a trickle charger. I took it out in march of 2020 and 2021 and been driving it unless it snowed. Just checked my oil yesterday after work with a heavy foot and was still full. I do check my oil here and there, maybe once a month and still shows full. Is my oil meter broken? Hope not.

Must only be happening to MY21 and probably why they haven't release the MY22 yet because of the engine oil consumption? :D

Happy with my purchased even when MY21 came out. Good luck to anyone with MY21, seems like half are having the issues and hopefully Toyota will take care of you.
 
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Loco38SUP

Loco38SUP

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Interesting data so far. It seems like the groups are trending towards less people having issues with excessive oil consumption.

-RJM
Sponsored

 
 




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