I lost oil pressure, didnt even know it & kept driving..

302efi · Jan 10, 2004

Well yesterday I was going to get my exhaust welded up and my girls dads shop. I drive up there with no problems, the car made no noise or got hot or anything. On the way back I'm sitting at the light, and I'm thinking I here the rockers ticking, but I'm like "nah can't be". So I pull into Wendys and I shut it off. I come back out and it's kinda hard to start. I drive home and the motor runs perfect. I left the car running and opend the hood and then I here the rockers screaming and it was burning hot! I checked the water, water pump ect, but it's all good. I then pulled off the drivers side valve cover, turned the motor over and no oil to the rockers! I then pulled the dist and checked the oil pump rod, in perfect shape. then I pulled the pan and checked the pump and the pickup. The pump is a high volume. Well the problem was the pick up, the previous owner used blue silicon to put the pan up and ALOT of it peeled off and got into the oil and cloged up the pick up.

All this could have been avoided if my lazy A$$ would have hooked up the oil sending unit and the temp gauge when I swaped the motor . When I drained the oil I was expecting a river of flakes and chips, but NOT A SINGLE ONE! So I figured, "there all in the bottom of the oil pan", when I pulled the pan no chips of flakes either! I drove the car at least 7 miles or so, so I would have put money on it that I destoryed the bearings ???

TT91 · Jan 10, 2004

hmmm..If you say that there are no signs of flakes or metal shavings, maybe you got lucky, or maybe not. If you have the pan off already, why not pop a main cap off and see what the bearing looks like. If it looks in decent shape, replace the pump and drive on. What is your setup, stock rockers? Or you could just replace the pump and drive it like it is. Youll defeintly hear somthing or feel it if you spin/spun and bearing. good luck.

shawnster · Jan 10, 2004

correct me if Im wrong but isint the crank and main bearings sitting in the oil in the pan? I mean when the crank is turning, oil is splashing everywhere in the oil pan..I dont think a bad oil pump would cause your main bearings to go bad if it wasnt driven that long..I would be concerned about the top half of the motor..

Maryland Stang · Jan 10, 2004

shawnster said:
correct me if Im wrong but isint the crank and main bearings sitting in the oil in the pan? I mean when the crank is turning, oil is splashing everywhere in the oil pan..I dont think a bad oil pump would cause your main bearings to go bad if it wasnt driven that long..I would be concerned about the top half of the motor..

Sorry but you are wrong. A lot of people go through a lot of trouble to make sure the oil in the pan never touches the crank even under hard acceleration. They make a thing called a windage tray that helps keep the oil from splashing on the crank. They also make a crank scraper that removes any oil that might be on the crank.

Main bearings will go bad within literally seconds without oil.

If you have the crank exposed just pull the caps like sirsureshot39 said. If the engine is still in the car just start it up. If in the first second or two of the car running you hear a rattling sound that goes away quickly then you definately have a main bearing problem.

302efi · Jan 10, 2004

my rockers are the Cobra 1.6's....Would it really be that hard to change the bearings with the motor in the car ? If I pop of a main cap, what exactly am I looking at ? The motor is Carbed with alot of mods and it was freshend up about 5K ago. Would it be ok to put the new bearings in with out having the crank turned?

Maryland Stang · Jan 10, 2004

302efi said:
my rockers are the Cobra 1.6's....Would it really be that hard to change the bearings with the motor in the car ? If I pop of a main cap, what exactly am I looking at ? The motor is Carbed with alot of mods and it was freshend up about 5K ago. Would it be ok to put the new bearings in with out having the crank turned?

Here is what a badly scored main bearing may look like:

http://www.tribology.co.uk/image/pb_23.jpg

When you pull the cap off just look at the inside part. There shouldn't be any scoring at all like is pictured above. Then look at the journal on the crank (the place the cap was). It should also be clean of any scoring. If you find any scoring the whole rotating assembly should be pulled apart for inspection and repair. It is easiest to pull the engine to do these repairs.

Buy a manual.

TT91 · Jan 10, 2004

302efi said:
Would it really be that hard to change the bearings with the motor in the car ? .........If I pop of a main cap, what exactly am I looking at ? .......Would it be ok to put the new bearings in with out having the crank turned?

Technically its impossible to change the bearings with the motor in the car...When u pop a main cap, youll be looking that the crank journal. It should have a highly polished appearance and SMOOOOOTH to the touch. Do not rotate the motor with a main cap off. When u remove the main cap, it will have a bearing that hopefully doesnt look like this-
http://www.tribology.co.uk/image/pb_23.jpg

As long as the crank hasnt suffered ANY damage such as nicks and scoring you should be fine. If you decide to replace the bearing and do a rebuild, it would be a good idea to have the crank measured using a micrometer and possibly looked at by a machine shop. Polishing a crank will usually get rid of any small eye sores, but turning the crank .010 will be the only solution for a badly scorn cranksahft.

Maryland Stang · Jan 10, 2004

sirsureshot39 said:
Technically its impossible to change the bearings with the motor in the car...
When u remove the main cap, it will have a bearing that hopefully doesnt look like this-
http://www.tribology.co.uk/image/pb_23.jpg

Two things.

First, it's not impossible to change the bearings with the engine in the car. Nothing is impossible. It may make the job harder but not impossible.

Second, if you're going to rip my post off at least do it in another thread. Find your own links chump.

And it's not "badly scorn", it's "badly scored". Jeeze.

302efi · Jan 10, 2004

Thanks for the pics guys ! God I hope my bearings don't look like that!!! I'm going to pull a main and a rod bearing tomorrow and have a look-see. So If the crank has even the littlest scar/nick I should have it turned ?

302efi · Jan 10, 2004

If I do change the bearings I was going to do them one at a time with the motor in the car. I'm trying to avoid pulling the motor if at all possible.

I lost oil pressure, didnt even know it & kept driving..

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