ashleyeb23

Hi everyone, I hope someone can help me.

My oil light came on this morning, I was going to stop at autozone and put oil in until I could get an oil change, well I was driving up a hill on my way to autozone and my car just shut off, my battery light came on but I think that was after my car shut down. I only drove for like 5 minutes with the oil light on so I can't imagine that my engine siezed but I don't know. It didn't make any noises or anything. When I put my car in park after it shut off my trunk popped open by it's self and I noticed a couple times last week that my trunk randomly opended on its own. I never really thought much about it. I went ahead and put oil in it anyways and when I tried to start it about 3 hours later the trunk popped again. When I try to start the car I have lights and everthing but when I try to turn it over I hear a click and then everything shuts off and then comes back on, like the dash will go black and then all the lights will light up. But the enging wont even try to turn over. Any ideas at all? I'll try anything at this point. I don't want to buy a new engine.

mack1

Hi ashleyeb23 and welcome to TSF

I'm thinking that the trunk poping open might be a separate issue than the engine. That the lights go out on the dash when you switch to start sounds like either a loose battery connection or siezed engine.

Do you have the car at home where you can work on it?

If the engine is frozen, the starter (the click you hear) should draw lots of current. The red battery cable should heat up. Give it a short try and immediately feel of the red battery cable. If it is warm or hot, the battery connection is good. If not, try using a jumper cable to another battery. Hopefully that will narrow it down to the battery or cable connections.

I don't know how much oil your car holds, but you might be able to judge for yourself if the oil level was so low that the pump couldn't pick up the oil. What it holds minus what you had to put in could tell you a good or bad story. If the car ran five minutes without any oil to the pump, it could be a frozen engine. I would expect though, that the engine would start running bad because the hydraulic valves would collapse when the pump could no longer pick up oil. Was the engine still running smoothly when it died?

Tell us what you find.

Wishing you the best luck,
Mack1

ashleyeb23

yes my engine was running fine my car didnt make any noise when it shut off. I didn't know until my car shut off until my battery light came on.

cardoc

Hi All
The fact that the engine light was on for five minutes means that the engine had no lubrication for that time.Even if it will run it will be forever altered.Sorry.As far as the dash going black when it tries to crank indicates a bad connection over loading and loosing power.This could even be caused by a bad battery connection.This may also cause the security system to reset.You may want to try to turn the engine by hand to make sure that it's not seized.Sometimes you can get it to turn by grabing and pulling the fan belt with a little grunt.

olemiss74

have you anyway to have a battery charger connected to the battery? If you can get the car to o'reillys, autozone, or NAPA they can check you battery, alternator and starter usually for no charge. Start simple and move towards more expensive problems. And your car takes a AC Delco 47 filter and 4.5 quarts.

ashleyeb23

So I spent the money and bought a new battery and of course that didn't do anything. So the engine has to be locked up. Does any one know a good place to buy an engine?

Thanks

mack1

Hi ashleyeb23,

The engine didn't necessarily have to be locked up. The fuel pump only runs while there is oil pressure, so if there was enough in the oil pan to splash up and lube the insides of the cylinder walls, you would have gotten away clean....if not, the pistons would freeze to the cylinder walls and freeze up the engine. I assume you tried Cardoc's idea of pulling on the belts to try to get it to rock or turn over. You could also get a large socket and put it on the nut on the end of the crankshaft at the harmonic balance and try it that way.

If it is indeed frozen, a local repair should be able to give you an estimate for engine block replacement. I haven't bought a short block in a long time, so don't know what it should cost. The other guys here should know.

Wishing you the best of luck,
Mack1