how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

[exnavyman123]

On my earlier post of my beep beep noise coming from my throttle control from reading older posts it seems to be a problem with my oil injection system on my 1989 mariner 115. They said it could be a faulty magnetic sensor thats molded in the engine oil resevoir, or air or no air in tank, or a leaking air line to the tank, and the screen could be gel ed up. I had the oil sealed in the container in the garage for about 2 years now ......

 

[roscoe]

Re: how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

Never seen tc-w3 oil, or injector oil, go bad, and I've seen some pretty old neglected motors.

I've used tcw oil that was 20 years old, with no problems.

If the oil itself has gelled, I would guess either it was not tc-w3 rated, or it was contaminated.

 

[Bamaman1]

Re: how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

I've never seen any two stroke outboard motor injection oil gel up. It doesn't do it.

The only oil I've ever seen that was like Jello was in a skidsteer loader that had been run 600 hours in heavy dirt without an air filter change/cleaning. The crankcase oil wouldn't flow, and it threw a rod through the block. This could happen to any 4 stroke engine without maintenance.

 

[j_martin]

Re: how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

Plugged up oil delivery from the tank won't set the alarm off. It senses level in the tank, and rotation of the oil pump. The oil pump could be pumping nothing, but if it's rotating, the modules thinks it's OK.

I suggest you obtain the manufacturer's maintenance manual, and go through the 1 page troubleshooting map in it for the oil system. That will get you quickly to the one failed part.

 

[Texasmark]

Re: how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

Never seen any oil gel up. I had an '89 115 with the "afterthought" oiler and to test the horn, just invert the tank and it is supposed to beep in pulses, not a continuous tone (which is engine overheating). I usually kept the oil level in the upper 1/3 of the tank to keep boat bouncing and wave action from accidentally setting the alarm off. Mr. Martin has a good idea.

HTH

Mark

 

[Faztbullet]

Re: how old does oil generally have to be to gel up?

Its either the oil sensor in tank or the oil module as this motor has no sensor to moniter pump rotation. The earlier TCW oil will gell as it gets older