Automatic Oil Dipstick for Automotive Applications

Laura,

What is requirement, measurement device for oil level with any automatic method or you need a stick with some sort of automation?

hello

basically the main aim is to develop a system to enable crankcase engine oil level to be indicated, without the need to open the bonnet of the vehicle and use a conventional dipstick. it will be sufficient to demonstrate the principles of operation for any proposed device in terms of a laboratory based test rig or mock arrangement. attention to detail with reference to praticality and cost tgether with he possibilty of retrofitting a conventional dipstick with a device/sensor to enable older vehicles to be adapted by means of an accessory

if you have any ideas on this it would be great!!!

thanks a million!

cars have been using them for years

its called a low oil light

hello

yes its a kind of a mixture of the two of these-well sort of! i had been thinking maybe about using a capacitor or maybe some type of capacatance rod as one of my ideas.

The process you want is identical to measuring the fuel level...Rover of England used just such a system on their 1950-60 six cylinder models (P5) and possibly earlier ones to measure gearbox oil level. The simplest system is a guage face with the needle connected to the solid core of a bowden cable (like a bicycle brake or bonnet pull cable). The cable runs all the way to the dipstick tube where the outer cable terminates in a fixing to the dipstic tube case. The inner wire is joined to a flat strip a few inches long, about 100 mm and 1/4 inch wide, it has a twistof around 300 degrees. A cork is placed on the bottom with a female slot in the middle into which the twisted strip fits. as the float/cork rises and falls it twists the strip which in turn twists the dial, showing the amount of oil in the sump. If you want an electric device, replace everything beyond the dipstick with a rheostat (attached to the twisted strip/top of dipstick tube) and place an electric guage in the cabin or wire the fuel guage through a push button switch which selects either fuel or ,when pressed, oil.

Have a lovely day

Mercedes currently uses this on thier new cars - Swing by your local dealership and you can research it first hand.

Laura,

Q: My apologies, but was your assignment to solicite ideas from other engineers (then you are a project manager) or to create your own inventions (then you are an engineer)?

All Modern cars will warn you if the oil level or pressure is too low to protect the engine, and race cars add telemetry to inform the pit boss accordingly.
Q: How would an automatic dipstick improve the reliability of an engine, by advanced warning to the driver, or is the task to mechanically measure the oil level by other visual means?

My Corvette lets me know what % of oil life is remaining in the engine as well by 'looking' at the amount of impurities in the oil. (I change it at 15%).

Good luck

In airplanes i use capasitance rods to measure fuel and oil to replace or to back up mechanical devices, they make the rods for all kinds of liquids and sell the read out also, they are easy to instal in just about anything that holds liquids.

How can you effectively measure the oil level in an internal combustion engine? Isn't the crankshaft spashing it around in the crankcase and the oil pump is pumping it around to lubricate the cam shafts and various bearings. Would even the sump have a stable level of oil in it? Perhaps a rule of thumb setting a minimum oil level in the sump that must be maintained to ensure that enough oil can be spashed and pumped to ensure proper lubrication would be useful but to my uneducated mind it would seem impossible to measure the actual amount of oil in a running engine.

Automotive sensors are invariably the cheapest type possible to make...

For many cars the oil level sensor is nothing more than a thermister passing a certain amount of current, when the car is started if there's no oil to cool the thermister the resistance goes higher than it should and the light lights on the dashboard indicating low oil level. If the oil is there it cools the thermister and keeps the warning light from lighting...

Don't think of any thing remotely costly as the automotive companies look at every penny that can be spared... Until 20 years ago the voltage regulation was done by a bimetallic strip moving on a resistor element to raise or lower the voltage! It really was / is a crude method, same as the fuel gauge, never believe that when it reads half full it really is half full!!!

John.

There have been solutions to this almost from the inception of the automobile. Early units had a vertical tube on the dashboard. Later, much later, Whitney was selling an electric unit that was placed in the dipstick tube with a dashboard readout. I believe it was a capacitive sensor (which is a normal method for liquid level measurements). Floats would also work if you have room in the crankcase although you obviously need more than one if you hope to get any reliable reading when in motion.

I'd think a google search would turn up more information than you could absorb in one semester.

My father had a 1948 Lincoln that had an automatic dip stick.

hello

this sounds really interesting would you have any other info on this as i could use it for some early history on the project?

i would be most grateful

laura

Laura, looks like "we" has decided to make you the sacrificial lamb. As an engineer you will soon learn to tell folks where to stick the dipstick, mechanically or otherwise.

Have you asked a mechanic? The old ones that have been in for years? I would bet that would give you more than you would need.

Checked your motorcycle lately? A sight glass is a common easy way to check oil as long as you can level the vehicle.

In the marine world they check eng. oil very simply.The dipstick tube goes well into the oil pan. This prevents false readings from the oil splashing around in the oil pan and getting all over the dipstick. Automatic transmission dipsticks use the same system. As we all know, you check with the eng. running in park. I supect replacing the dipstick tube with a straight longer one, the dipstick with a small stiff wire with a small float that would float at the oil level in the tube and using a varible resistor measure the lenght sticking out and calibrate it . Alittle fooling around IE:(engineering) with leaks and crankcase pressures. Hope it gives you an idea. Best Regards, Jay