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How much oil does my engine take?

organizedinsanity

New CEG'er
Joined
May 18, 2008
Messages
17
I have a '96 Contour with the 2.5 and cant for the life of me find the oil capacity anywhere online or elsewhere. I put 5 qts in and it is where it needs to be on the stick but someone mentioned 6.5 qts. Is that just for an svt or is it for all duratecs?
 
You dont have the glovebox manual handy? I think it says 5.5 quarts when you also change the filter. People throw an extra half/whole quart in there because of the drainback/pickup stories.
 
I am usually dead-on with 6qts with priming the filter. So I would imagine between 6-6.5qts is pretty much on the money.

edit:5-5.5 usually give me a full reading before I crank the engine, afterwards it will read low.
 
some years called for 5qts.. SVT's called for 5.8 (because there is an oil cooler installed, etc)

The 6-6.5 you are hearing is from those who are overfilling slightly to avoid what could be a problem with oil starvation on long sweeping right handed curves (think: cloverleaf on ramp). This isn't near any limit to be too full, but provides some extra buffer oil in case you would have been running low.

The manual can be obtained at :

www.fleet.ford.com
click "maintenance" then "manuals" on the top.
PDF format.
 
some years called for 5qts.. SVT's called for 5.8 (because there is an oil cooler installed, etc)

The 6-6.5 you are hearing is from those who are overfilling slightly to avoid what could be a problem with oil starvation on long sweeping right handed curves (think: cloverleaf on ramp). This isn't near any limit to be too full, but provides some extra buffer oil in case you would have been running low.

The manual can be obtained at :

www.fleet.ford.com
click "maintenance" then "manuals" on the top.
PDF format.

I guess that's why I never had any problems with 6qts, lol. 5.8 is a bit hard to match anyways :crazy:, j/k
 
I have a '96 Contour with the 2.5 and cant for the life of me find the oil capacity anywhere online or elsewhere. I put 5 qts in and it is where it needs to be on the stick but someone mentioned 6.5 qts. Is that just for an svt or is it for all duratecs?
Download an Owners' Manual free www.fleet.ford.com

For the 1996 V6 Duratec, the manual calls for 5.5 Quarts.

Put in 6 quarts and you should be "safe" (from the oil starvation issue).
 
I run 6 qts all the time to be safe and I dont hit any corners in vader, but better safe than sorry.
 
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