Patent ID: 8179242

Claim:
A method for diagnosis of oil quality for oil within an internal combustion engine, comprising: monitoring an oil level sensor; determining a rate of oil consumption based upon a plurality of readings of said oil level sensor; continuously determining a trend in said rate of oil consumption, comprising: monitoring a decline in said rate of oil consumption; determining an inflection point when said rate of oil consumption begins to increase; and determining an increase in said rate of oil consumption subsequent to said inflection point to exceed a threshold increase in said rate of oil consumption; determining an oil oxidation condition based upon said trend in said rate of oil consumption indicating said increase in said rate of oil consumption exceeding said threshold increase in said rate of oil consumption; and generating a warning based upon said oxidation condition; wherein said threshold increase is selected to correlate to rapid oxidation indicating an anti-oxidation capability of said oil has been depleted; wherein said threshold increase in said rate of oil consumption is defined by said rate of oil consumption increasing and exceeding a selected value.