Morning all,

I've had my 03 outlander for a week Tuesday and the oil light came on yesterday while in the car wash and has been ever since when I'm idling. The dealer says its the sensor but from the research I've done it sounds like an oil pressure problem. The vehicle has 155k km on it. Whenever the light comes on the rpms decrease slightly and the car vibrates more. This is my first mitsubishi so I'm just looking for opinions from people who know a lot more then me! Thanks

 

If the dealer says it's the sensor, than that must be the problem.

That's the fiirst thing to check. Go to an independent shop that you have confidence in and have them put a gauge in the system. Then go to the dealer with the results..

 

I'm taking her in today but just wanted to add something I forgot. The light comes on dimmer and it flickers. And since it started after a car wash maybe it's an electrical short.....I'm really hoping this is not the case though hopefully its just the sensor

 

The engine has an on/off type switch that is pressure activated for determining if the oil pressure is at a safe level or not. When the pressure drops below the rated range of the switch (very low, single digit pressure), the switch closes and causes the oil light to come on. Unfortunately, the switches do get lazy with age, and even begin to leak in some cases causing abnormal behavior and erroneous oil pressure light indication. If the oil pressure were genuinely low, you would have some excessive noise from the top end of the engine, as once the oil pressure gets below a certain point, it can no longer properly lubricate the top of the engine. The pressure simply isn't high enough to reach fully all parts of the engine. Increasing engine RPM also increases oil pump speed, and by doing so increases oil pump volume. This is why revving the engine slightly causes the light to go out. Remember this does not necessarily mean that the pressure is too low at idle (though of course possible),but rather than the indicated pressure is too low. Be it accurate or not. Whenever dealing with oil pressure issues, the safest route is always to get a mechanical oil pressure test performed to verify actual oil pressure. This is the only way to determine for certain what your pressure is inside the system.

 

Hi Jeff

I recently changed my oil and filter
and after a couple of days the oil light was coming on at idle.
I checked the oil and it was in fact quite low so I topped it up with a liter of oil.

Problem is the light still comes on at idle even though the correct amount of oil is on the engine.

So I figure that the oil switch is now faulty considering that the vehicle has done 340,000 km

What do you think?