oil pressure drop

S

skinsman

Guest
why woudl the oil pressure drop while acceleration? then build back up at idle
1989 thunderbird sc
has synthetic oil and has been overheated a couple times due to bad radiator
could it be the bearings? oil foaming? I am stumped
thanks for the help all appreciated
Jonathan
 
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skinsman said:
why woudl the oil pressure drop while acceleration? then build back up at idle
1989 thunderbird sc
has synthetic oil and has been overheated a couple times due to bad radiator
could it be the bearings? oil foaming? I am stumped
thanks for the help all appreciated
Jonathan

Usually it is a bad connection at the guage. Check that first.
 
oil pressure gauge

As I understand it, the oil pressure gauge on an SC is not really a true gauge, but rather just an "idiot light" with a needle to appear like a gauge; in other words it shows whether or not you have oil pressure but does not vary by how much pressure you actually have. Mine would fluctuate sometimes but I attributed that to different electrical loads, like AC on or off, etc. I've read posts here where people have converted their gauge to a true gauge that shows variable pressure, I don't know if you have done this.

First step would be to screw a test gauge into where the sending unit goes to see what the real pressure is, and go from there.
 
After installing a new cam last week, my car did the same thing. Everytime I pressed the throttle down hard the oil pressure gauge would quickly dive to zero pressure and the red check gauge light would come on. Scared the crap out of me.

Ended up being a very easy fix...the wire that plugs onto the sender was loose. Just needed to be removed and squeezed a little with some pliers and re-attached.

David
 
Mine has been doing the same thing for a while now. About the 3k under acceleration, the stock oil pressure gauge will drop off until it's basically reading nothing. Well...same thing, except I just replaced the sender with a spare I had and it's all good.
 
The problem comes in as the switch (oil pressure) is like a snap action switch. As more and more pressure is added it bends the contacts in a way that allows them make a more poor connection, that's why the preeure on the gauge "drops"

If it were a real gauge, I had a 350 once that the pressure would drop when you got on it. It turned out that the pickup had backed out a little and was sucking air.

Jeff
 
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