Sludge in a 2002 Civic
 

Alright, I'm new here so hopefully this isn't one of those topics that has been discussed endlessly, although I did do a search and couldn't find quite what I was looking for. My friend has a 2002 Civic LX with 135k on it. She told me that for the past week or so she's had a red oil can light on her dashboard, so while I was visiting family this weekend I took a look at her car. There was no oil on the dipstick at all, so we took it straight to Valvoline where she gets her oil changed. I would have done it but I didn't have any tools with me and we were short on time. When they went to drain the oil they said we were lucky to have made it across town--most of the oil had apparently turned to sludge. They said they flushed the sludge out with more oil and then topped it off. The car was running conventional oil, and she had gone 5k over the recommended change interval (which was also 5k).

Generally speaking I do most of the maintenance on this car, to keep costs down for my friend. I know that sludge can be a major problem (my BF has a 1.8T Passat and they're notorious for it), so I want to try to take care of the problem to the best of my abilities (and her budget). I was thinking about getting some Seafoam or the like and running it through the engine, and then changing the oil again when I go back into town next week. I would imagine that the flush they did at Valvoline didn't take care of a good deal of the sludge, resulting in a bigger future problem. Thoughts on this idea, or any suggestions?

Also Valvoline is a huge rip-off...they charged her $59 for an oil change using conventional oil. I can change the oil in my 2009 GTI (which takes more oil that has to be full synthetic) for considerably less than that.

Most engine detergents are not a good idea, since they will wear the engine quickly, and if there's already wear on the engine it will only make it worst.

The sludge on the engine are most commonly a combination of poor maintenance/oil quality and there is a lot of controversy on how to proceed, but for me the best is to do oil changes at shorter intervals.

don't use expensive oil (neither cheap) just the bare OEM recommended, nothing fancy will do the job since you will not be overstressing the engine (i guess).

Once you can see cleaner internals, you can switch to a better top-notch oil if you want to.

holy **** im surprised the car still runs driving around with no oil pressure thats what the oil light indicator is for oil pressure not oil level. tell her to never drive with that light on immediately pull over and shut the car off. as far sludge goes thats mainly a thing of the past because all conventional oils use detergents to stop sludge from forming and with regular recommended changes should never happen.i seriously doubt it turned to sludge and most likely burned off if there was no oil in the engine it went somewhere. quick oil change shops like to use sludge as a scare tactic. seafoam would be fine as long as you follow the instructions. regarding oil i would recommend using Mobile1 high mileage full synthetic with a mobile1 filter. advanced auto parts has a special going for 5 quarts plus a filter for 35 bucks.

Surely you omitted topping of the oil before going to get it changed.

Personally i'd change the oil ( castrol gtx and pure one filter $20 on sale) into a clean container and filter it to see if you have any metal shavings. Peak through the oil fill hole. Should look like a relatively clean metal surface covered in a thin film of oil.

Like mentioned above, red lights for oil and temp mean pull over and stop.

Thanks for the input. I'll check the fill hole and see how it looks in there, and provided the owner has the funds I'll try to do another oil change as well. I'll also pass on the information about the oil light--I live out of town so I was unable to look over the car prior to last weekend. I think the car was driven around for around a week with the light on.

WOW! Maybe they should include an audio with the light mentioning the pull over safely and turn off the vehicle oil pressure is low.

alot of folks these days just aren't into cars as much and don't understand the difference between say a scheduled service light vs a oil pressure light?

Do any cars come with an oil level light vs oil pressure?

A few newer cars check the oil level for the warning light. I don't think that any Civics do. Like you said, when a pressure-operated light comes on, it may already be too late to avoid severe damage.