ive heard from a few differnt master techs to go by the dip stick and NOT the 5.6 quarts, and that they allways take a littlemore than 5.6. You state you worry about your car burning oil, with you changing your oil every two months you must be putting pretty decent mileage. Hiway does seem to burn a little with the volvo engines (im talking about like pure highway sustained) i do notice some oil burns away mabye half of a quart, but thats on my trip back to college, 1300 miles, about 12 hours for two days of solid 75 driving, regular use i dont notice any useage. And i only notice useage when im nearer to the 3000 oil interval. People that burn complain of 300 miles a quart thats a oil burning issue.

check your oil daily note your level, record it, when you add oil note that as well, you can make a graph and see if you really are burning.

oil recovery means noting, clearly not every drop of oil comes out, a lot is probably lost in the filter. Are you changing the oil hot? Haynes recommends running the car 10 min and get it up to temp to help get all the oil and dirt out. Do you let the car sit for a while until the oil stops dripping?


if your oil level is low i dont think it would trigger much of anything in terms of warning. You speak of a guage volvo doesnt include a guage are you referring to the ECT (engine collant temp) guage?

if you want your car to last and know you might have a oil issue you should be addressing it weekly not at the oil change point.

if you really are burning oil you can experiment with 20 w30. What state are you in? In nj we have strict emissions run on a dyno with computer analysis up to highway speed, if a car was not performing up to par im sure NJ DMV would let me know :-).