Any Meineke or Jiffy Lube or corner gas station mechanic should be able to do it, quick and easy. Stop in, talk to them first, and if you decide to have them do it then you can help them by finding and buying the oil pan gasket for them, and return with it when you’re having the work done.
I’ll echo the comments saying the dipstick will not exit the tube into the oil pan and there is no magical way it can get to the crankshaft. The oil pan is designed to keep shards from getting sucked into the delicate parts of the engine. The needle nose was the correct method DIY, just the wrong implement. I’d invest in one of these. They won’t fall in and should reach much further into the tube. It’s been a few years and vehicles since I owned one but, IIRC from my Wrangler, the dipstick went into the tube easier if it was turned to follow the curve into the oil pan. The flat part should be in that orientation.
No local shop I deal with will let me buy and bring my own parts for them to install. Not anymore since about 7-10 years ago. Not if they stand behind their work.
The dipstick cannot fall out of the tube. It will stay there doing nothing.
It is quite unlikely that the stick can be pulled out. Anything thin enough to reach it won’t be able to grip it.
It makes a lot - as in a LOT - more sense to remove the tube than the pan.
I’m not familiar with this engine, but in the V8 ford,Chevy, Chryslers I’ve had apart the above is true.
I’ve never been inside the oil pan when it’s on the motor. I can’t even say I’ve thought about where the dip stick sits in the pan…it’s kinda not one of the big “glamour” parts people try to visualize it’s position or movement, like cams and lifters etc.
That said,Beowulff has to be correct. A few quarts of oil in the pan can’t be all that deep, and the dip stick usually goes a few inches into the oil.
So I guess the end of the dip stick has to be pretty close to the bottom of the pan…kinda like losing a drinking straw in a shot glass.
I say the stick bottoms out in the pan and hurts nothing.
If you must get it out I recommend hemostats. I get mine at the flea market.
Warning, the stoner kid shopping next to you will giggle and wink when you buy them.
If the tube is anything like the one on my car you could cut down it with tin snips; find and remove the dipstick if you were concerned about its presence in the tube .
I’ve done it regularly for years. Maybe one key is to establish a rapport with the mechanic, and then also to bring the parts in their original packaging.
And then there was the time when I was young and poor and we were a 1 car, 1 motorcycle family (young wife, and 3 young kids), and my brother, the one I pitted 5 years ago, borrowed the car and returned it with the tranny all chewed up — it made all sorts of lovely noises. I talked to my local shop, and much as I expected it needed a new tranny. But I was darn near broke. We discussed and agreed I could go to the Pick-N-Pull yard and bring them a tranny, and they’d install it for me. A low-budget but solid solution.
I vividly remember strapping that transmission onto the back seat of my motorcycle (carefully!), a humble 1983 Yamaha 650 Special, and riding it the 50 miles home to San Francisco, including across the San Mateo bridge! (gMap) it was for a great car back then, a 1981 Toyota Starlet, a car that just ran and ran (unless it was driven by a certain brother of mine :smack:).
It’s a flippin’ oil pan gasket, fer crykees sake! It should be a straightforward discussion. Or, have them order the part if they insist on not working with any parts you bring yourself.
Curious — why the tube over the pan?
A person may be able to “fish” the dipstick out with a piece of thin, stiff wire. https://www.harborfreight.com/0041-inch-stainless-steel-lock-wire-1-lb-coil-8895.html
Take a piece a foot or two long and twist it into a helix, like a looong screw thread… Then twist that down into the dip tube, and rapidly jerk it back out. It may take several tries, the concept being that eventually the wire wraps itself around the dipstick and snags it when you pull backwards.
I can’t understand why removing the pan is even being discussed when lifting out the tube is so much easier, less messy and requires no parts. The broken stick is in the tube.
Typically much easier to access, one (or possibly 2) fasteners vs. many, job done in 5 minutes vs. many.
I mentioned it initially as a last resort, to say there’s definitely a way to get that stick out. If removing the tube is easier it’s definitely the way to go. It’s not like dropping an oil pan is open heart surgery, but it will need a new gasket or you’ll be seeing oil stains on the driveway.
Thanks. I’ve never had to do that before. Another advantage is that it’s probably less messy than pulling the pan, but with the tube you have to be careful that dirt doesn’t fall in, as already mentioned.
I’m curious why anyone would suggest removing the oil, the oil pan, the gasket. Replacing the gasket, reinstalling the oil pan and replacing the oil when the other option is removing the tube.
Imagine you have a milkshake. If you drop something into the straw, you could pull the straw out and grab it and put the straw back in. So why would you cut the bottom of the cup off then go buy a new shake?
Removing the tube will cost no dollars and can be done in the driveway from above the car (if he wants to do it himself). I’m guessing anyone that’s asking this question isn’t going to drop an oil pan in their driveway.
OTOH, I see your last post, if you hadn’t thought of it, you hadn’t thought of it. The only reason I thought of it is because I’ve had those tubes move around on me from time to time so I knew they were removable. Otherwise my first thought also would have been to remove the pan.
Could one of these grabber tools get the dipstick? The grabber is thin and it might be able to slip down into the hole. It has claws at the front which you can use to grab the dipstick and pull it out. Most hardware stores will have them.
Surely an 8" hemostat ($6 on Amazon) is the proper surgical tool, and would get this thing out with little trouble?
I am so seriously not a mechanic, so wait for input from somebody who knows before following my advice!
It’s winter, and I haven’t thought of milkshakes in a while either. But yeah I suppose if I just looked at the tube and thought about it, of course it’d have to be removable from the engine block! :smack:
More: oh and oil changes are both frequent and easy enough, so dropping the pan is an easy extension to the job. My thoughts, anyway.
Engine oil dipstick tubes have small diameters. While there’s an outside chance that either tool, when closed, could fit into one, there’s essentially zero chance that the claws/jaws could spread far enough to grab anything.
On some cars, maybe. On most cars, no – either quite a bit more work or A LOT more work.
Some dip stick tubes are pretty hard to get out but I think the majority are relatively easy. I have no idea on a jeep product