GSL-SE Oil Pressure
 

Hello All,

I have a question about the oil pressure gauge on a 1985 GSL-SE. Here is the behavior:

-Under idle conditions the gauge sits just above the 0 pressure line, practically touching it.

-Under acceleration the pressure will build maxing out below 60 near redline

-Under highway cruising the gauge will be below the non labeled line between 0 and sixty.

I looked the FSM and it said I need to check the oil level, which I have done. And then I need to hook a pressure gauge to the block and measure the pressure with a gauge.

Before I go buy a pressure gauge I wanted to make sure I am not chasing a non issue. Is this normal? If not do I need to up the oil viscosity, currently running 10W-30. Is this early signs of my oil pump going bad?


Other things to note. The motor runs fine over all feels nice and strong. I am running 10W-30 conventional oil in the car. And I believe it currently has a purolator filter. Current mods are a Conical Air filter and a full "street port" RB exhaust.

Thanks,
Andrew

symptoms you describe are the typical mode of failure for the oil pressure sending unit.

Is their an easy want to verify this? Or just plunk down the $50-60 on a new sending unit?

well the factory manual has you hook up a mechanical gauge, step 1 is to see if there IS a problem in the motor.

i would swap in a different sender, or an after market gauge, to see what the problem is, but i have that stuff around

get one off any 12a or 13b from pick n pull for about 2 bucks

Agree that it's probably just the sending unit. These things seem to 'take a set' once they've been in a car for awhile, and you might start to see what looks like low oil pressure on the gauge (or in your case, NO idle oil pressure), but the engine is actually just fine.

The FSM is written that way so dealerships don't run into problems where they replace a sending unit for this issue, and the driver blows up the motor because there's a internal oil problem - a REAL problem for the dealerships.

The sending unit 'mushrooms' are cheaper at AutoZone or Pep Boys, IIRC, and are made by Borg-Warner or some other OEM supplier.

Not a hard fix in the grand scheme of things.