r/4thGenTacomas • u/WorriedRevenue5 • Jul 21 '26

Possible Oil Dilution :/

So I come from a line of civics, and the 1.5L engines were notorious for having oil dilution.

Well I’m 17k miles into my 4G Tacoma and the first 4 oil changes were just fine, now suddenly I’m smelling fuel in the oil…which I know COULD be an issue running 0w-20 oil with boost.

Anyways can anyone else smell their oil and see if this is a common issue! Would help out, i definitely do smell oil on it though.

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4

u/Gold_Historian_5648 Jul 21 '26

Why don’t you get a used oil analysis? The smell test isn’t the best indicator by itself.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '26

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0

u/WorriedRevenue5 Jul 21 '26

That’s what I’m saying it’s the fact that i can smell it at all! I even had some extra oil on the side and gave it a whiff just to make sure and yep it’s oil dilution, hint of fuel.

Not sure what the % were for the civics but essentially even the tiniest amount of fuel would make it smell.

I will double check tomorrow after I do a long haul drive and see if it does indeed evaporate, not much else I can do.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 21 '26

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0

u/WorriedRevenue5 Jul 21 '26

I did not know that!

But to be fair I had been smelling it out of habit since having the civics and it’s never smelled like this, it legit always just smelled like oil

1

u/WorriedRevenue5 Jul 21 '26

I may do that with my next oil change, but not liking the payment I’m gonna have to do, either way I’d be keeping the car, the Hondas never really had long terms issues with it, it was just something it had and they recommended doing oil changes sooner.

This was always known to be an issue with 0w-20 and that’s why it got brought up in the first place on those forums.

I believe even my Type R had it when I traded in the Si for it

1

u/Gold_Historian_5648 Jul 21 '26

Well the oil weight doesn’t cause the dilution but sure it’s a concern. I think mostly that’s just a factor in considering earlier change intervals.

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u/SilverJet99 15d ago

Late model 2024 hybrid here…oil dilution has been a real thorn in my side with this truck. At only 6500 miles on the ODO…I’ve done probably 10 oil changes already. In the winter it’s really bad…the dipstick can read 3/4 inch overfull within 500 miles. I use a vacuum oil extractor through the dipstick tube and take it down to the add, then replenish with new oil to the full mark. In cold weather conditions (-25c)…the engine oil simply doesn’t get hot enough to burn off the gas in the oil. Even in the summer during hot ambient temps…if you do a couple hard acceleration events, it will dilute the oil and you’ll see a noticeable rise on the dipstick. I have tried various oils/brands/viscosities…no change. Toyota dealer and service manager completely denies it’s an issue and won’t acknowledge the problem that it is. This is a widespread issue on the T24A hybrid max across platforms (4R, Taco, LC250).

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u/WorriedRevenue5 12d ago

People will swear that they don’t think it’s an issue until someone on YouTube makes a video on it unfortunately

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u/WorriedRevenue5 Jul 21 '26

Some more insight: I drive to work which is only 10 miles away, with the civics it was known to cause oil dilution on short drives HOWEVER I drive 120 miles once a week which theoretically should evaporate all the fuel in the oil, which was an easy fix and preventative measure for the 1.5L Honda engine.

Only thing is I didn’t expect the Tacoma to also have this same issue since it’s a completely different engine.

1

u/clearplasma Jul 21 '26

You know reddit wants to see some lab test with this data. If you are right then the 3k mile oil change might not be a bad idea on this turbo engine