Joined the dark side

[Roland H]

Sounds like a leak somewhere... what was the condition of your pickup tube? Did you prime the pump?

[Cloudbase]

I have nothing to add, but I feel your frustration. Good luck man...

[tehwickerman]

I didn't really look at the pickup tube I figured it would be fine since everything is new...

yes primed the pump.

thanks for the good wishes hah this is turning out to be more of a handful than i was hoping for but oh well... good learning experience.

[fsmtnbiker]

Get a gauge on it and see. I've seen the stock sensor fail and indicate low oil pressure when it was actually fine.

I have an M12x1.5 to 1/8" NPT adapter, if you need it to tap the oil pressure gauge in.

[tehwickerman]

so after doing some research i found that the electric oil pressure gauge i have causes the oil light to stay on regardless of if the pressure is what it should be.

got a mechanical gauge on it and these were the results..

idle



at about 2,800 rpm



the car does seem to be idling a bit low because the intake elbow is cracked and is causing a vacuum leak.

everything looks good to me... pressure shoots right up with any application of throttle.

what do you guys think?

[fsmtnbiker]

I generally see 8-12 psi at hot idle at 650-700rpm in a M50 family VANOS motor. At least 25 psi by 2000rpm when everything is hot.

Yours seems a little low at idle... But the running pressure looks fine.

[tehwickerman]

i put a smaller scale gauge on and was getting around 15 psi at idle so i definitely don't think oil pressure is an issue.

that had me worried... got all the suspension put back together but of course the slave cylinder is bad and i forgot to order one so waiting on that to get here.

then it should finally be on the road, so excited!

[tehwickerman]

drove the car for the first time tonight....

one thing led to another and I just ended up replacing the clutch, adding a lightweight (10.4 lb) flywheel, slave cylinder, etc.

now the car has a healthy list of mods and damn it's quick! love it so far... pics to come.

[fsmtnbiker]

The flywheel is one of my favorite parts. Really wakes the car up.