I recently purchased a Legacy with an IO-550 and I’m still learning its idiosyncrasies. Maximum oil capacity of the engine is 8 qts. I’m finding that more than 6 and a bit and I end up with oil on the belly. Is this reasonable and/or in-line with what other Legacy owners experience? If so, do you let it get a full quart low before you add oil?

 

Regarding oil on the belly: The Legacy assembly manual describes attaching the oil breather line to the firewall such that oil drips fall on the exhaust pipe and are burned away. Currently my breather line exits outboard of the exhaust pipe, thus the oil ends up on the belly (and rudder if there is a lot of it). I looked at a Piper Malibu yesterday that had an exhaust pipe tip with a fitting that accepted the end of the breather line, thus routing oil drips into the exhaust stream. I’m wondering how others have dealt with this.

 

Thanks,

 

Jay Phillips

N92SX