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Oil pressure scare

clazar

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A couple days ago while driving my car, I stopped at a red light. The oil guage went to "0" ( zero ). I made a quick right turn to get off the road & the oil pressure shot up to 20 lbs. 20lbs is still not good but good enough to get home. After some deliberation, we put a mechanical guage on the port next to the sending unit. We felt it would be either be guage, sending unit or oil pump. The motor had recently been rebuilt . All new parts including oil pump, oil pressure sending unit were installed at rebuild. We took out the distributor ( we wanted to work on it anyway ). Put the oil primer shaft in & the mechanical guage went to 80 lbs. So now we felt either bad guage or sending unit. We then replace the sending unit with a new USA made unit. Started the car & the factory guage went to 60 lbs. So we knew it was a POS sending unit probaly made in China. I don't know where for sure the unit was made. But i'll never buy anything else if I can help it from China. But is it normal for the factory guage be 10 - 20 lbs off ??
 
what brand sending unit did you buy thats made in the US? I run both gauges on my Bee.
 
what brand sending unit did you buy thats made in the US? I run both gauges on my Bee.
I bought it on ebay. Seller stated it was made in USA. Actually came in plastic bag that said Mopar on it.
 
I don't know how accurate a factory gauge is..... but i trust a mechanical gauge 100% more than an electric one.
One of the "mods" we used to do in the garage back in the day. What I have in my car to this day.
 
Been there before too. Panicked when I simultaneously lost oil pressure and my car stalled on a hot day.

Took me 4 tries. Parts store unit failed immediately, 2 miscellaneous used ones, and another parts store retry. I think my latest one was made in Mexico or Brazil? I'm not sure of the accuracy on many of our stock gauges.
 
Been there before too. Panicked when I simultaneously lost oil pressure and my car stalled on a hot day.

Took me 4 tries. Parts store unit failed immediately, 2 miscellaneous used ones, and another parts store retry. I think my latest one was made in Mexico or Brazil? I'm not sure of the accuracy on many of our stock gauges.
It puts a scare into you.
 
I got a factory idiot oil light so I installed an aftermarket gauge cluster (Volts/Temp/Oil). Had a scare last year with an engine noise I thought could be deadly. Wound up being something simple. I watch my oil pressure more often these days as a result.
I have no tach so my two most important gauges are oil and temp.
 
IMO....The two most important gauges on the instrument panel are: TACHOMETER and MECHANICAL OIL PRESSURE GAUGE.
BOB RENTON
What about radio ? Turn the volume up loud enough, and it drowns out engine knock and other nefarious noises ! :lol:
 
I had that happen about 50 years ago with my 383 in my '62 Dart. Stopped quickly, and the OIL light popped on. I gave it a quick rev, and it went out. It turned out the pressure relief valve in the oil pump had gotten varnished up and was sticking wide open sometimes. At idle, this valve closes somewhat, to cause a restriction, keeping oil pressure in the circuit. On big block motors with the external oil pump, this is an easy fix: unscrew the pump plug and pull the relief valve and spring out and clean them. Also clean the the valve bore, and reassemble. Small block engines, with the internal pump, require dropping the oil pan to access it.
 
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