When I put my boat away at the end of the season 3 years ago I changed the oil and filter. At least I think I did. Life happens, and now 3 years later I am sailing again.
Today I did an oil change and it was not fun. I bought an oil extractor from West Marine and extracted about 2.3 liters of oil. I was hoping for more, but that is all I could get through the dipstick opening or through the fill tube. I had thought from reading many posts that more should come out if pulling oil from the dipstick hole, but that was not the case. My next challenge was getting oil into the engine without getting it everywhere. The opening in the filler tube was bigger than than my smallest funnel. How do people get oil into the engine without making a mess?
I am using Rotella 5w40. The engine seems to run fine and in fact it seems to be running a bit cooler. Does this make any sense.. Thanks in advance for your advice.
Randy Gadikian,
Paisley Moon
NS 26 C #32 (I think)
On the W13 there is a drain hose. It comes out at the front of the engine and has a 1/2” bolt in it. Take the bolt out and put the extractor tube in it. I used a larger sized tube that would not go all of the way in but I would tape in place so it did not leak. You will get most of the oil out using this method. There will be about a cup of oil in the oil filter that will drain out as you remove the filter. You can put a plastic bag around the filter but I always managed to spill some.
There is an oil filler cap on top of the engine. With practice you can pour the oil in from the 1 litre or 1 quart bottles without spilling. Alternatively you can buy a measuring funnel with a lid from Canadian Tire that works as well.
A tip on filter removal. I punch a hole in the bottom of the filter with a large nail and drain it first before moving it using a plastic bag. Usually this prevents any mess.
For filling with reduced spillage, I put a tube on the end of a funnel, run the tube into the oil fill, and pour the oil into the funnel from outside the engine compartment. Not a perfect solution, because then you’ve got another tube full of drippy stuff to deal with, but I offer it for what it’s worth.
I haven’t had great luck getting the bulk of the oil out of my W-21, though, even when using the drain hose mentioned in posts above. If anyone would like to post more details about how to make that work, I’d certainly appreciate it.
Canadian Tire sells a spout that screws right onto the oil bottle for $2. It is flexible and somewhat extensible so it is a step in the right direction.
What I discovered by accident was that a 2 liter Coke bottle has the same threads as the oil filler cap. Cut the top off of the bottle to make a funnel and screw it right into the valve cover. You are still left with a messy “funnel” to deal with, but it is very stable and makes refilling the engine oil a lot safer and easier. Pour in the oil and then go and do something else while the residual oil drains before removing the “funnel” and mess is almost non-existent.
I’ve never looked forward to doing an oil change, and I can’t really say I’ve ever looked forward to buying a bottle of Coke either, but now I can hardly wait to do both!
On my new-to-me 26C with W13, I did my first engine oil change last autumn.
Nothing new here, as others have covered the steps, but for me:
plastic bag around oil filter when removing worked quite well. A little bit of a spill, but cleaned up ok.
I let oil drain out of the tube into a small container, (brought oil sump tube almost level) and poured it into a larger container. That was SLOW and painful. See below.
filling - I could only get a 4l container of oil, so I got one of these filler-with-shutoff-valve and snap on-lid, things, put oil in a bit at a time. I found that I could put the reservoir behind the metal strut above the engine, open the shutoff valve, and it would drain well. I could hold the reservoir against the compartment ceiling, and against that metal strut, so that part was easy and I didn’t have to concentrate accurate pouring.
To make it easier for next time:
I picked up a Pella 2.5 litre oil sucker at the Toronto boat show, so will see how that goes.
Wondering about somehow making a drip tray out of a tin-foil bbq drip catcher for putting under the oil filter - will see. The drill/punch 2 holes is an old trick, but thanks for Paul and Allen for reminding me - I might also try that.
Glad to hear that you are getting things going again;
Thanks for the great replies. I really like the idea of installing inspection ports. I would put one in by the dipstick as well as one on the deck over the engine. These will simplify maintenance tasks a great deal. The engine runs like a top now and with these inspection ports added an oil change will be less of a chore.
I’ve shifted over to a synthetic 5W40 due to a previous oil analysis showing an improvement over the non-synthetic.
Joe Valinoti
S/V IL Gatto NS30U #221
Sea Harbour YC
Oriental, NC USA
I used to run a fleet of small ferry boats with diesels. The results in reduced wear were stunning when we switched to full synthetic. I wouldn’t consider anything else now.