A bit of a hint to save your battery when doing a compression test - remove one plug from each piston so there is no compression on the engine, and then test one piston at a time - that way the starter is just pumping one piston at a time. YOu have to take one plug per piston out anyways...

160 is low for a NA car, should be 190 - 220 depending on the gauge, etc.

I doubt if you "broke" the bottom end from doing just the heads - that would be a wild coincidence. However, we have seen things like a little cloth plug was left in the inlet hole, and when started, the cloth was sucked into the primary oil pump circuit, jammed the pump and broke the layshaft - but in your case you are getting oil pressure, it just seems to lower as the heat comes on.

You can just swap out the sender unit if you do not trust the oil pressure sender you have. I can send you down a used one that I know works, but it will take time at the border...

Cheers,

Mike

I have to mention this since a client of mine had some similar troubles when he went to re-install his engine,....

Perhaps,......just perhaps something fell into the oil tank and got stuck in a hose, thus starving the engine of oil. I would review all the small details about the engine extraction and installation just in case something happened.

I think we asked Peter to check the inlet and outlet oil hoses, but I think that ended up being an external inspection. I guess the only way to check internal blockages is to take it off the solid line at the engine (gush!) and see what happens, and perhaps run a scope into the tank. He will lose the tank of oil, but when doing a rebuild, you expect a few oil flushes anyways.

Peter, if you are going to start to drop the engine again, why don't you disconnect these lines and check for blockages first? if you pull the line off the intake of the engine (the one just below the small oil filter with the 13mm bolt holding it in), all the oil in the tank will drain out so be prepared - but it should drain FAST. You can also use a flashlight to make sure no blocks are in the inlet of the oil pump by visually inspecting the opening on the block.

Cheers,

Mike

Been following this saga. I'm afraid to say this sounds a lot like oil starvation. Sure hope I'm wrong.

HA! At this point draining oil out is a piece of cake. Before I proceed I have 2 questions.

1. When I cleaned out the pressure relief valve about 3+ quarts came out. Does that sound about right?

2. Regarding looking in the inlet w/ a flashlight do you mean the hole where oil normally comes out during a change? I.e., on the crankcase?

Yes, something is up here. My gut is telling me there is an oil blockage somewhere. I have thought long and hard about how that could have occurred. I had the Travis Saga in mind during the rebuild so I was mindful of rags, etc... but you never know.

Maybe something crawled inside and died! It has happened before.

Any debris in the oil when you changed/checked out the tensioner and pressure relief valve?

You also mentioned the oil level did not move this time. Maybe you can drain a bit of oil from the tank...and a bit from the engine...then compare the two. If they looks/smell/feel/taste different, then that would indicate an oil circulation.

Nope, not that inlet. There is a main feed line from the tank to the engine - the inlet is just below the small oil filter on the engine. You had to remove this to drop the engine. If you undo the 13mm bolt and pull out the metal tube, that will expose the main oil feed line to the engine. If you peer down that hole, you will see the oil pump gears for that side of the circuit. Use a flashlight, if you can see the bottom, that end is clear.

I have not removed the pressure relief with the engine in the car and the oil systems all hooked up and full. It does make sense thought that is quite a bit.

Cheers,

Mike

You mean they should be the same? Not sure how accurate or practical that test would be, but I hope the engine is getting some oil (which it sounds like given oil on the tensioners and pressure relief spring) or it would have siezed.

In the case I mentioned, a nut had somehow fallen into the tank when everything was re-installed and it was sucked into the oil pump inlet. Needless to say, it wasn't pretty since he'd driven the car for a few miles listening to some odd sounds.

I won't belabor the details here, but it wasn't cheap to repair. Thankfully, you've not driven the car.

You might find excess sealant in places that it shouldn't, all the way to FOD so given the lack of proper oil pressure and noise, I'd likely encourage you to take it apart, barring discovery of something obvious.

I meant to say "indicate an oil circulation problem".

And if there is an oil circulation issue from the engine into the tank, then after running for 10 min you should expect to see some slight differences in oil that is in teh engine and oil that is in the tank right?

ok, I see now.

No debris whatsoever at the relief valve. In fact I strained the oil through a fine sieve to see if I could detect anything. Nothing.

When I removed the right tensioner cap I did find a little dried/hard loctite 574 which I had used as a sealant for the gasket.

this is unfortunate, but imho, its gotta come back out.

All of our guesses are like pin the tail on the donkey with the donkey in another zip code.

sorry dude, at least the engine removal should go much quicker

Yes. Agreed. I'm gonna disconnect the oil line first per Mike's suggestion, take one last look around and then drop it.

And, as this will be my third engine drop it should go quickly.:burnout: