Ever notice this? What is the oil temperature supposed to represent? can anyone trace the origins of this icon?
Um, perhaps it means the oil temperature is above a threshold?
I also assume you’re not mistaking it for a coolant temperature icon…
The oil light in a car is for pressure, not temperature. If it goes on, you’re engine is likely going to need some work or you’ve got an hellacious leak.
Or you could have a malfunctioning warning light.
Really tricked-out cars with all the gauges do indeed get oil as well as coolant temp gauges. As has been pointed out, if you just have a light, it is almost certainly an oil pressure light.
However, I think what you are asking is not what has been already answered. You seem to be asking “what is this icon supposed to be a picture of?” Answer is, it depends. What does yours look like?
If it’s like mine, it’ll be a drawing of an old fashioned oil can.
Mine is like Mr. Blue Sky’s, with a drop of oil falling from the spout. FWIW, the water temp gauge has a thermometer hovering on lines representing water and the trans temp gauge has a thermometer inside a drawing of a gear.
It would be helpful if you described the particular one you are referring to but, as has been said, the most common represents an oil can of the type you held with one hand and pushed a knob with your thumb to squirt oil out the spout. I don’t know I’d call the old fashioned though. They still work for their intended purpose; they’re just not as common since many bearings and otehr things do not need oiling.
Oil icon, if it lights up check oil.
If you have an oil pressure guage,if the pressure suddenly drops to zero (or goes to the red zone at the bottom) shut engine off immediatly.
And all this time I thought it was a gravy boat; light comes on, gravy’s done!
My driving instructor said the oil pressure light was the most serious warning you can get. If it comes on, stop the engine immediately, or the whole thing will sieze and you’ll have a very heavy, very expensive paperweight.
A conventional temperature light/gauge is the engine coolant, not the engine oil.
Well, I’ve had my oil pressure light come on, and everything was OK after I drove to the nearest gas station and added some oil.
The entire point of the warning is to tell you something bad is about to happen before it does. It wouldn’t be much help if it didn’t warn you until after the engine was wrecked.
You sure that wasn’t an oil level light, RealityChuck? In the distant past, I owned a '76 Plymouth Fury (318) which had a light instead of a gauge, and when it flickered it was time to add 2-3 liters. I believe what Bryan Ekers is referring to is zero oil pressure (pump failure or complete loss of oil) , which means engine failure is imminent.
The symbol (pictogram?) looks to me like an old-fashioned oil pitcher. When my pa was a youngster, service stations drew oil from barrels. A customer would see his quart drawn and poured into his engine. I have two antique motor oil vessels, neither of which look exactly like the int’l pictogram for “oil.”