My 1999 Ram Sport is losing oil about 3 quarts every 3000 miles but no oil on the ground and can not find any leaks around the motor also no smoking out of the tail pipe tail pipe looks normal

can anyone help me I can not fix what I can not find

Mark

It has got to be burning it if you don't see it on the ground. When oil burns it does not always make the thick blue smoke. Do a compression check and see what you get if you have low compression chances are you are burning oil.

It has got to be burning it if you don't see it on the ground. When oil burns it does not always make the thick blue smoke. Do a compression check and see what you get if you have low compression chances are you are burning oil.


so would that mean rings or valve seats

On the bottom of your intake manifold there is a removeable tin plate or pan,usually the gasket goes between that pan and the intake manifold then oil gets sucked in to the intake,I would put money on it that gasket is bad,the best way to check it is to block off all the hoses going to both valve covers,including the pcv line,take off the oil cap and let the engine idle,there should be no vaccum at the cap,sometimes you can lay a small piece of paper over the oil cap hole and see if it trys to suck it in.You would need to replace the lower intake gasket and intake gaskets if there is vaccum there,not a bad job....

http://dodgeram.info/tsb/2000/09-05-00.htm
Try this.

hey i just had to re and re a motor in my 96 ram 2500 because the person who owned it before me used a cork plenum gasket and it got sucked into the motor . that started the problem of losing oil like yours did but i didnt realize that after the plenum was repaired with a new one that was metal instead that the oil had allready gone past the pistons rings and therefore sealing the fate of the motor check your plenum gasket first and hope it didnt go any farther and they are right do a compression test that will tell you if your rings have been compromised.

How many miles on your truck? A quart every 1000 miles is not bad. Some engines just consume some oil, probably past the rings. If it doesn't get any worse, I personally wouldn't worry about it. The only way to cut consumption may be a complete rebuild, and then it may not help. OKAY, the rest of you experts on here can jump all over me now for such an answer.

I think you are right on the money. Every brand new vehicle I have had would go through a quart at least every 3000. Something to think about, when your dipstick reads a quart low it doesent neccessarily mean you lost or burned the oil. Oil loses its integridy running through the motor(breakdown) When this happens it becomes less dense(thinner) therefore it takes up less space and does not sit at ass high a level as when it is new. And yes, synthetic does the same. Some oils are worse than others for this. All in all if his motor is running good I would run it until it drops.

http://www.hughesengines.com/general/fasteners/magnum_fasteners.asp#plenum_cover_kit

plenum (intake manifold gasket). the ones from the OEM had a tendency to break down and get sucked in on the corners. Happened to my 97 Sport with 75k miles on it. Not a bad fix, just labor intensive. I also had developed a ping, and changing the plenum gasket completely eliminated it.