Oil by the quart Audi Q5 please help.

[kissdaring]

2013 2.0T Audi Q5. I replaced the fuel pump because it was faulty but I’m noticing that I’m burning oil at fast speed. I just did a oil change about 2000 km ago or less and I’m down to half on the mmi??. I’m not sure if that’s normal? I know they burn oil but I don’t think this much.. I don’t see that being normal, also there are no engine lights or no stored codes. Do you guys think it might be a PCV valve? Or am I looking at much bigger issues? I don’t notice any puddles on my driveway so it’s not leaking from anywhere that I can see anyway. I notice I bit of white smoke when i cold start the car but goes away shortly. My tail pipes indeed are a bit black.
Much appreciated!

[ILVTRANCE]

Did you happen to do any research on the common known oil burning issues on the 2.0? probably your rings. get ready for $$$$$

[kissdaring]

You mean piston rings? You didn’t suggest pvc? It’s burning fast! Too fast. You don’t think it’s a oil level sensor issue? Because I’m not getting a top up message and I just checked and it’s at half! I though once it gets to a certain point I notifies you? Just bought the car not long ago so don’t have much info on it’s passed.

[plumbot]

The level indicator in the mmi is essentially showing the high and low marks on a dipstick. Once it reaches to the bottom of the gauge in the mmi it will notify you are low . If it’s at half then you’ve burned maybe half a quart.

[kissdaring]

That’s kind of confusing! Half of quart? I would think mmi showing full would be 5L jug and half would show 2.5. Am I mistaken? Because half of quart in 1000 kilometres isn’t all that bad.

[Smac770]

There's no point showing you a bar displaying level below the minimum allowed to operate the vehicle. It's a digital dipstick; physical dipsticks don't go to the bottom of the pan either. If the bar represented the full reservoir, you wouldn't be able to see anything useful. The yellow warning would come on at ~90% and the red warning would come on around ~80%.

[kissdaring]

I guess I’ll keep driving and see how many kilometres I can get before it’s at 90% oil level. I’m assuming at 90% it takes a quart to bring it back to full?

[NikolaZ]

min max difference in the MMI is 1 quart/liter :) So you are burning a quart every 2k kms, which means the problem with the pistons have not been fixed.

[Smac770]

Assuming you filled the oil level after the oil change with the correct volume, 4.6L (4.9 qt), then you drive until the yellow oil level warning comes on. That's the add 1L point. Then you know how many km you can go on 1L.

The display bar will be empty before the yellow warning comes on. At least it's that way in mine. If the display bar gets to the bottom, I add 0.5qt and see where it ends up. Sometimes after a long drive (5 hours nonstop 80mph), the bar can drop out, and then it'll come back up over the next day or two. So I don't want to add a full qt in one go.

There's no point waiting till the yellow warning. You should never let it go to the point of seeing the red warning; that should only come up if you just broke something and dumped all your oil on the road.

[Smac770]

I guess I’ll keep driving and see how many kilometres I can get before it’s at 90% oil level. I’m assuming at 90% it takes a quart to bring it back to full?

It's probably 80% to yellow warning (1qt down on 4.9qt / ~1L down on 4.6L), then something below that to the red warning. Not 90%, as that'd only be half quart. As for the red warning, I don't know anyone who's hated their engine enough to run it down to the red warning and then seen how much they could extract.

[Norskie]

You mean piston rings? You didn’t suggest pvc? It’s burning fast! Too fast. You don’t think it’s a oil level sensor issue? Because I’m not getting a top up message and I just checked and it’s at half! I though once it gets to a certain point I notifies you? Just bought the car not long ago so don’t have much info on it’s passed.

At least get a real dipstick so you're not overfilling if it is the sensor. You might get lucky and find it's not the rings.

I'd consider consuming 1L/2K km is definitely "bad", but we've had members with worse. It depends on your tolerance level; at some point it may ruin your cats.

If the consumption increases beyond what you're comfortable with, before spending $5k+ USD to replace the rings it might make sense to try replacing the PCV.

[kissdaring]

I’ll be swapping out the PCV today and will report back if that helps at all I’m hoping that it does.

[markcm]

For reference, I had a 2008 A4 2.0t and a bad valve cover (pcv passages built into the valve cover) caused excessive oil consumption.

Also keep in mind that as I recall, VW/Audi specify 1qt per thousand miles as "within tolerance". But, that isn't good. I've owned many audis and most have gone a full oil change cycle consuming less than a quart (3500-5000 miles for me).

And I agree with others that the indicator represents the usable range (~1qt), not the full oil pan capacity.