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So F***ing pissed rant. RUNNING WOO HOOOOO Q??

K85 Octane said:
4) Thanks Phil. I'll PM you. I have a question about the ground for the dizzy. I don't see one. I think my spare green wire is for a tach. I have my autometer tach connected to the cap. Is this right? It could be grounded through the body, via the hold down collar. Unsure... There's no ign box btw.
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yep tach lead comes off the cap, and it grounds though the dizzy body to the engine my dizzy is out of a caddy with a msd coil and cap a abomination of sorts, use a voltmeter set on ohms, check resistance from the dizzy body to the neg battery terminal should have 0.50 ohms of resistance or less. if its more than that (mine was) my cap had a terminal labeled with a " - " which i checked and was grounded to the body of the dizzy so a spade connector and some wire i ran to the ground on the frame.
 
Just remove the coil cover and snap a pic then post it here and I (we) can tell you if you are missing the ground strap.
 
OK, I've got fire. I tested the wires inside the cap. My coil wire had 12.4v. I plugged it back in and tested the RED COIL + (pic above^^) and only got 2.5v. I was baffled. So I unplugged it again and F' ed with it some. Plugged it back in and I got 12.4v. I think there was some bad contact between my coil wire and cap. Dunno

I tried to get it to run but it only wanted to sputter. It is timed perfect at (what I think is) TDC. My rotor vs. balancer. So I'm either 180* out or something else is wrong.
 
Im not sure if this has been asked before, but do you have a timing light? That will tell you real fast whats happening.
 
y5mgisi said:
Im not sure if this has been asked before, but do you have a timing light? That will tell you real fast whats happening.
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:) I have a timing light, but it wasn't running, just firing while turning over with the key. I had the dizzy set right, just wasn't advanced far enough. Never done this before and was surprised how far I needed to turn the dizzy. It's now running and timed at 8*. I ran it for 10-15 minutes or so while at 1500-1700 rpm. I had 55ish psi oil pressure while warming up. I let it get up to 195, which it held for the rest of the time.
I watched my tach, oil, and temp. I was going to let it idle after those 10ish minutes, but noticed I had dropped oil pressure some. At running temp and ~900rpm, I only had ~15 psi, so I turned it off. I don't know what that means:confused: and kinda scared. It's a new Mellings pump, it's what my uncle normally uses. It's running CompCams break in oil, 10w30 I think it was.
 
Video :D The oil pressure dropped some shortly after this. 12-15 psi at 195* idle. Is that ok? Double checked, 10w30 compcams break in oil w/zddp


 
actually
it's even lower than that
I've stopped tying to work on it. It wont idle lower than 900rpm. It will chug at 600rpm but the oil pressure is only at ~5psi so I'm afraid to work on it anymore. It is an electric autometer with autometer sensor. It shows about 55psi when first started, then very slowly drops over several minutes to damn near zero.

I don't know what to do.
 
so, refresh those of us that don't feel like searching...

History of this new motor? Crate? DIY rebuild? Local shop rebuild?

~5 psi is low, if the gauge is reading correct and it truly is 5 psi you should hear the lifters collapsing and ticking at that oil pressure level. If you're not hearing ticking, it may be time to install a mechanical oil pressure gauge.

Rene
 
Uncle built it at his machine shop
400sb, '92 heads, all new rebuild
It sounded good and revved nice, I just couldn't get it to idle less than 900rpm. The oil gauge was low even at that rpm. I didn't try hard to get it to idle, since the oil pressure was low, I shut it off and called it a day. It was quiet as far as I could tell, being open headers it was kinda noisy.
 
it may be time to install a mechanical oil pressure gauge.
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I would really try that first. And if you still come up short, i would possibly start with the iol pump. Maybe you have a weak pressure relief spring in it or maybe its just a bad pump. Who knows. Now, if you have low pressure even after the pressure gauge and oil pump (if you go that route) then you will have to start with the more serious investigating.
 
K85 Octane said:
Uncle built it at his machine shop
400sb, '92 heads, all new rebuild
It sounded good and revved nice, I just couldn't get it to idle less than 900rpm. The oil gauge was low even at that rpm. I didn't try hard to get it to idle, since the oil pressure was low, I shut it off and called it a day. It was quiet as far as I could tell, being open headers it was kinda noisy.
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That is the WORST possible thing you could do with a new/fresh engine. For the fact that you can't hear things properly with open headers means you could easily have had a noise you couldn't hear and the engine kept running and did irreversible damage.

There are only a couple things that will cause low oil pressure and that is an oil screen that fell off the pump, a bad pressure relief spring in the oil pump, bearing clearances too loose, or an oil galley plug behind the cam gear that either was forgotten to get put in or came out. This is assuming that the gauge you're using is accurate. I would suggest testing the oil pressure with a known good mechanical gauge very first thing AFTER you have some exhaust on the engine.
 
One quick longshot thing to try, pull the sending unit for the oil pressure and examine the end of it and the hole it came out of.

I'm thinking a big gob of prelube or some other grease might have plugged the hole.

Otherwise, find a gauge you can trust, and try to get it where you can hear bad noises like he said.
 
Can anyone recommend a super cheap mechanical gauge I can use to verify my pressure?
Also, Scott, I haven't gotten it to an exhaust shop cause I need to drive it a few feet away from my house to get it on a flat bed. I'm sure the guy at the shop is going to want to drive it up on the lift too. So....I'm not sure how to go about this. Run it and check the pressure first, then move it around to get the exhaust done. I have about 1.5' of tubing coming off the headers, just to get the exhaust away down and away from everything.

uggg
 
Don't you have some old mufflers laying around that you can slip onto the pipe you have on there now? If not then find a buddy with some that you can use for a day and at least get the thing so it isn't open exhaust.
 
J
I can check that, but how is it I'm getting 55psi and losing it once everythings warmed up. Ugg, this truck has been a rollarcoaster of one up and many floundering downs.
 
Sorry Scott, I hate not being able to do something with peoples good suggestions, but I know NOBODY lol. I have one muffler, 3" inlet, but there are two down pipes in 2.5" size coming off the headers ATM. I can try to get a tow truck to winch it out from it's current position. Then drop it off at the muffler shop. Getting it on the hoist is another obstacle.
 
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