Hi all, Stock standard EA II SPack, just wondering what oil pressure others get according to the oil guage on the cluster? Mine seems to be down fairly low, and when at idle, the needle is almost in the red...

HI
when i first brought my ea when it was cold the oil pressure was half way on the guage.. but when it warmed up and after i gave it a bit of a thrashing the guage would go almost into the red. i checked the oil and it was thin and dirty . so i put penrite hpr 30 with a new oil filter and now when it gets hot the oil pressure sits about 1/4 on the guage at idle.
this has helped but i guess the bottom end is showing signs of bearing wear. unfortunatly the engine isnt going to get better..
after saying that i have been thrashing it for 3 months and the oil pressure still sits 1/4 on the guage....
so try a thicker oil and see what happens..

how often do you change your oil ???
what oil do you use???

Yeah first things first, change oil and filter. HPR 30 is a good middle of the road oil for older engines and use a good quality filter too. I have heard that cheaper filters can collapse inside and cause big low oil pressure problems.

If that doesn't work, put a master guage on it and see what your oil pressure is acutally like. Sometimes the guages are dodgy or it could be the sender. If sender tho, they usually read really high and fluctuate heaps.

I had an EB 4.0 that had exactly the same problem. It was a broken pressure bypass spring on the oil pump. It is sposed to release during high pressure times, but mine was weak or broken alltogether and the oil pressure was down around 15psi but wavering between 10 and 30psi about 20 times a second.

I change my oil every ~5000 k's, and the oil used is Visco 2000 (20w50) the filter changed every 10000. All this is done by the mechanic.

Not sure about what sort of filter is used, but i could check. Just gotta pop my bonnet...

The sender im assuming is ok, the guage doesnt do anything too eratic, just seems to read really low on idle.

You should definately check it with a master guage, as the problem like I had did not show up on the dash guage. Sure it read really low, but the movement on the master guage was not replicated on the dash.

Also, the master guage will tell you if you have a problem, or if your dash guage is just stuffed!

Hi i would try a different oil ive always used penrite oil in my 6 and my v8
it seems to hold its viscosity well..
i also use motorcraft or fram oil filters ive used a couple of cheapies like cooper or black and gold and they seem to collapse internally but you dont know they have collapsed unless you check them out when you change them. most people just take them off and chuck em...

At idle, mine is almost in the red zone of the low side, but when I give it a boot full, it goes almost into the red oh the higfh side! crusing it stays in the middle....stock MPFI EA S, 5 Speed manual, 1 week old (today!) Castrol GTX2...

Well that tells me theres something wrong with mine. Same car, and the needle on the guage is either in the red at idle, or when driving, it never gets past the first line on the guage....

Rang the idiot mechanic today to tell him about this, as theres a bit of top noise from the top end of the engine, and suggested the oil pump may need looking at. He said that the oil pump is most likely fine and that hes the mechanic hell tell me when there is a problem. Ill go off tomorrow when i see him after its serviced if he tells me he will replace the oil pump next time he has the car...