[dana44]

Welcome to the forum. If she is indeed burning oil, need to discover where it is burning it. Start with checking the sparkplugs and the PCV valve. A dirty PCV valve will suck oil and start gumming things up, plugs can help determine what is going on inside the cylinders if it is rings, valve guides, or burning from the PCV valve. We can go from there.

 

[ImperialCrown]

Welcome to Allpar. Any yellow 'ck eng' light on in the dash? Has it been checked for fault codes?
Any recent tune-up with the correct Champion RC10PYPB4 spark plugs?
Malfunctioning PCV valves can cause excessive oil loss as noted above and is the first thing to check other than drips hanging underneath the engine. Do you actually get any smoke out of the tailpipe?
This discussion may get moved to the Neon section down on the section list.

 

[YellowBird]

Thank you so much for replying. I'm not mechanically inclined so I shall have my ex check this out. It appears in my zest to treat my car with special care I may have messed up with the oil as well. I bought some "Defy" oil for older engines. When I went to get more today at Walmart I noticed that it is a synthetic oil. Hopefully that hasn't made things worse. Geez.

In answer to the questions above = there are no lights on the dash indicating a problem, and no smoke coming from the tailpipes so all seems well there. It's been a little while since a tuneup - about 25,000 km - but I've had the oil changes and a checkovers religiously. Thank you for giving me a starting point. I worried because it's always been peppy and just lost its zest all of a sudden. Would like to keep my baby around for another few years.

 

[dana44]

Dirty PCV valve will do this.

 

[chuzz]

I agree with Dana. I'd also be curious if you've ever done a tune up on the car. If not, you really need to replace the spark plugs, and PCV valve along with a new air filter. Perhaps some Techron fuel system cleaner in the gas tank and a good throttle body cleaning will help too. Too many variables and unknowns to get a 100% accurate fix.

 

[peterjon1]

Some people, in some instances, have found that using synthetic oils will cause more rapid oil loss. My Stratus tends to use a little more oil between changes with synthetic vs. dino. You did not do any damage by using a synthetic.

 

[Bob Lincoln]

I've been using synthetic oil on older cars since about 1997, with no change in oil consumption at all. I've driven about 300,000 miles with synthetic in 4 different vehicles.

 

[ImperialCrown]

According to the owners manual, an engine oil meeting Chrysler MS-6395 spec is recommended. It should state this on the bottle. Avoid it if it does not.
While everybody will have a different experience with using synthetics (it may be fine for most cars), I have seen them increase oil consumption that goes back to normal when the proper engine oil is used (particularly when the car is brand new and not broken in yet).
Make sure that at your next oil change that you use an oil meeting MS-6395 and then monitor your oil consumption.

 

[dartguy340]

Welcome to the site, hope you enjoy it as much as I do!