SD60 Oil Level

[crayiii]

We had the saildrives serviced last week by a Yanmar shop and then motored 30 minutes to our anchorage. I checked the oil levels today after sitting on anchor for the last few days and both drives were too full (about 1/8 inch maybe less over the full marks). I just removed oil from both to bring the levels to about 1/16 or so below full. This was all checked without threading the dipstick in.

Does that seem right? The oil level can be checked when these drives are completely cold, right?

Also, why do these techs keep overfilling the drives!!??!!

[Captain Bill]

Originally Posted by crayiii

We had the saildrives serviced last week by a Yanmar shop and then motored 30 minutes to our anchorage. I checked the oil levels today after sitting on anchor for the last few days and both drives were too full (about 1/8 inch maybe less over the full marks). I just removed oil from both to bring the levels to about 1/16 or so below full. This was all checked without threading the dipstick in.

Does that seem right? The oil level can be checked when these drives are completely cold, right?

Also, why do these techs keep overfilling the drives!!??!!

They probably put in the specified amount of oil, but when changing the oil from the dip tube, not 100% of the oil is removed, hence slightly over filled. Just to note it takes less than 100ml of oil for the level to go from the low mark to the high mark. How much oil did you have to remove to move the level 3/16ths of an inch.

[crayiii]

Originally Posted by Captain Bill

They probably put in the specified amount of oil, but when changing the oil from the dip tube, not 100% of the oil is removed, hence slightly over filled. Just to note it takes less than 100ml of oil for the level to go from the low mark to the high mark. How much oil did you have to remove to move the level 3/16ths of an inch.

I removed about 110ml from each drive. Doesn't seem like much but everywhere I read says overfilling is really bad.

[Howler]

According to the SD60 manual, when you use the dipstick to check the level of oil, you're supposed to let it rest on top of the threads (i.e. don't screw the cap down). Are you sure you're checking tit this way? If you're screwing the cap down, the dipstick would effectively show too much oil, when in fact, that's not the case.

You might need to add some oil back depending on your answer to the above.

The relevant page from the SD60 manual is attached (if I did it right).

[crayiii]

I don't thread it in when I read the level.