This isn't the first time Ford had a dipstick problem
...I changed the oil in my Mustang 5.0, put in the recommended 5 quarts, and it read almost 1 quart over full. (Yes, I drained both plugs). I posted a message about this to corral.net and someone wrote back saying that:
Ford goofed up on the dipstick.
Since they never bothered to fix it, they issued a TSB stating that the "max" mark isn't really the max mark and it's normal for the oil to be over the max mark after an oil change.
I just used a file to make a new "full" mark after changing the oil and adding 5 quarts.
You have to wonder if maybe Ford goofed up on the dipstick for the Contour, and covered it by specifying a smaller amount of oil rather than doing the right thing which is to redesign the dipstick.
Brian
