Driving with 1 quart of oil?
 

Here's the brief back story. My friend was out of the country for a year and her family used her car but never maintained it. It had been about a year since its last oil change (right before she left the country). Her family put an additional 20,000 miles onto that car in the year she was gone.

She came back last week and drove up to visit me (~350 miles). I checked the dipstick and didn't even catch any oil, so I helped her do an oil change. The oil that came out when I removed the drain plug was almost COMPLETELY black. And the worst part was, after it was done draining, the used oil only filled up to the 1 quart mark.

I replaced the filter, tightened the drain plug, filled it back up to the 5.5 quarts specified in the manual (2011 forrester), ran the engine, and checked the dipstick to make sure it looks good. The engine sounds normal and it seems to run fine.

My question is, how is it even possible for her to drive 350 miles on only 1 quart of oil without her engine seizing up or blowing? What kind of damages could have been done?

Would almost seem impossible that an idiot light didn't flash at some point (if it has lights and not a pressure gauge)

I've seen cars like that before, my friend had one and i've pulled out the dipstick dry on her too. Somehow the car survived for several more years.

My theory is that some oil, even very little, is still better than no oil.

lmao this story seems impossible

You are saying somehow a brand new (2011 according to your post) burned all but 1 quart of its oil in 20k?

haha

While 20k would be an appalling change interval, I hardly think it would burn all the oil.

If all runs fine don't worry. And oil turns black after a few miles. Take your own car and do a 500 mile oil change and you will see it is black.

I changed my BRZ oil at 7,500 miles and it was only half as dark as this. Another thought, could it be that something was stuck inside and not all of the oil could drain out? If that was the case, then I has too much oil in it now. The dipstick is kind of horrible at reading the level.

It's probably fine. I just don't want to send her off driving 350 miles back down with a potential problem, lol.

her family added 20k miles on it in a year? did none of their vehicles use a drop of gas in that time? so they depreciated her vehicle a few thousand dollars and then didnt even have the courtesy of changing the oil in the car? her family SUCKS A LOT. Personally i would disown family members at that point for just not caring about my personal stuff like that. imagine if they blew her engine up and left her with the bill?

It's mostly in part due to her family's ignorance, and her brother's stupidity.., but I won't get into it. They were paying the finance bills when she was gone, though.

She had the car for 2 years - 14,000 miles. Came back a year later - 34,000 miles.

I wouldn't worry.

I ran a Saturn SC2 out of oil at 200k miles and I drove it to 260k with no trouble at all. The throttle cable finally broke when I was on the freeway during rush hour, and I just called a local towing company and offered them the car in exchange for getting me off the interstate.

The reason it ran out of oil was that it had just been given to me by my Uncle at 200k miles. (It had been stolen and he bought a new car in the meantime) I took it to Saturn of Bellevue for new belts, oil, brakes, tires and fluid flush. I then drove it for three months without checking the oil. I was used to my '77 Celica coupe which didn't burn any oil even at 220k miles. The Saturn was a chronic oil burner and it caught me off guard. That thing went through a quart-a-month! Didn't seem to hurt that little 1800 DOHC though. I hated that car, but it never let me down.

Oil is overrated

The oil being black isn't a bad thing. Some cars will turn oil black in a couple thousand miles. Some of them will go six months and the oil will still come out looking like honey.