Quote:
Originally Posted by Racer Boy
The oil isn't just in the heads when the engine is running. Think of the oil pump, the cooler, and all the oil passages throughout the engine. All of those add up to a fair amount of oil being in the engine, and not the sump.
|
True. But it`s a closed system. The oil that circulates will not flow back to the sump when the engine is off, or at least most of it remains in the oil lines, cooler, pump, etc. If this wasn`t the case, the main bearings would be starving of oil at every start up and they would fail shortly. When you pull apart an engine, especially a boxster, oil is flowing out from every oil channel and gallery producing a huge mess on your garage floor, even though you already drained the sump. When the oil pump gears are not rotating they seal off and won`t let the oil flow back to the sump. As a result, oil level should not change much during engine run vs stop, IMHO.