Oil Pressure Oddness

[Barrykearley]

The pump simply won’t pull it up. Try the syringe option - I needed to pump over half a litre backwards vie the turbo pipe to get that pump to work.

Make sure you have pulled the plugs and it can’t start - the pressure on the moving parts is massive when it’s running. Turning over on the starter is much kinder with no compression forces 

[eeyoreish]

Pulled the plugs or just the leads? King lead is already off so it's not going to fire.

Just wondering if, even primed, the starter will spin it fast enough to pull the air through?

[andydclements]

If you pull the plugs as well as the king lead (or disconnect the AB14) it will reduce the load on the starter as well as the load on the bearings that aren't getting their oil supply.

[eeyoreish]

Studying the oil system schematic in the manual, it seems that all the oil on the outlet side of the pump goes out to the cooler first, then returns through the filter and into the oil galleries. I can try syringing some oil into the sender port in the gallery (same place that Barry used) but presumably I'd be pushing oil towards the cooler, not directly to the pump? Maybe it's still enough as it pushes oil back through the cooler pipes to the pump??

The only direct access to the out feed of the pump looks to be from the oil filter housing, which unfortunately is lower than the pump so anything I can get in would just run back out again?

[Barrykearley]

I pumped a dose load of oil backwards - then turned the starter with no plugs in until  I got 0.5 plus of a litre back out that pipe. Even on an NA you can use the same take off from the block ??

[eeyoreish]

The gauge sender port is next to the Turbo oil feed port (blank on the N/A) so yes, it's accessing the same oil gallery. I guess in reality what's happening is you're pushing oil back round the cooler pipes, through the filter housing and back into the outlet side of the pump, thus filling the pump with oil.

Not sure trying to do that with a syringe is going to be enough. Sounds like it needs some oomph from a 12v pump to push the oil in and force everything round to the outlet side of the pump.

[Barrykearley]

Above shows the oil paths. If you can pump on one of the tell tail transducers backwards - it fills up the galleries and does get back to the pump

[snowrx]

With a dry engine, I push the first quart or two of oil into the turbo line/ oil gallery into with a transfer pump, using a ratchet clamp to get some pressure. The excess may go to  the cooler lines, but at least there's some oil at the bearing feeds for startup. I also top off the oil cooler lines before I attach them to the filter adapter. As advised above, always give the pump rotor some thick lube to help it prime and move the air out.

 

[eeyoreish]

The oil cooler lines should still be pretty full on mine as they stayed pretty much in position throughout and I half filled the oil filter before I fitted it.

I'll try pumping some oil into the gallery with the syringe tomorrow and spinning the engine over with the plugs out. If that fails I'll have to drop the cambelt off and try spinning up the oil pump alone with a drill as per Andy's suggestion above.

I'm just starting to get a bit twitchy about turning the engine over even more without oil pressure ☹️

[Barrykearley]

You don’t need to take off the cam belt - just get a pump and push that oil backwards - it’ll work - been there and done it. It was a very worrying time on the S4s start up process

[eeyoreish]

Thanks Barry 👍 I'll  give it a go tomorrow with the big syringe

Comforting to know some other folks have had similar problems!

[Barrykearley]

We used a small oil transfer pump - cheapo 12v thing. It worked at the first time of asking. So hold your nerve.

dont let that engine fire until you know you can get oil pumping from the pump

[eeyoreish]

Yes, those pumps are a tenner on eBay. Problem is I need it tomorrow so the manual syringe option will have to do. I'll pump as much as I can in there's and spin it up

[Barrykearley]

Machinemart might do something

[Barrykearley]

seriously - don’t rush something that could end you in a world of pain for the sake of waiting a day or so

[eeyoreish]

I'll see what I can rig up tomorrow. Otherwise it'll have to wait until next weekend

[eeyoreish]

Decided to have a day off this today but I did order a 12v oil transfer pump as per Barry's advice so I'll have that to back prime through the sender port next weekend.

In the meantime I learnt today that the Lotus distributor has an oil seal in the base, as well as the external o ring.

I don't have any oil in the dizzy but thinking back to my original problem of slow pressure build, could air be sucked in past this seal and slow the oil pump from building initial pressure? A worn ring can allow air past so just wondering if this could do the same? Or would I just have a dizzy full of oil...?

[Barrykearley]

It would just weep from the distributor I would have thought. Get a pipe you can screw into that sender port to assist in priming and proving the pump is working 👍

[eeyoreish]

Thinking I can either use the adaptor from the manual pressure gauge with some pipe pushed on it or even borrow the Turbo feed pipe from the TE engine if the connection is the same thread.

I'll see what's what when the pump turns up this week

[eeyoreish]

Ok so oil in the sump is on the max line and I've pumped almost a litre into the sender port, which doesn't seem to have raised the sump level so must be going through the cooler pipes and up to the pump as expected.

Spun it over with plugs out for a few seconds (10 maybe) but nothing coming back out of the pipe I have tapped into the sender port. How long should I expect to crank it before I see something coming back down the pipe from the pump? @Barrykearley what did you experience on yours?

Or do I need to pump in some more oil (i.e. I haven't reached the pump yet?)

[andydclements]

It wouldn't be unreasonable for an engine at tick-over to take 30 seconds, and that;s at c1000 rpm, so cranking at c400 rpm could take much longer. Bearing face damage due to lack of oil needs lots of force and/ or heat, so you're safe to crank it over for a long time. Just watch that the starter doesn't over-heat.

[eeyoreish]

Thanks Andy. Ok, cover me, I'm going back in... 😳

[CarBuff]

When we refreshed our engine, we needed to actually start it to obtain oil pressure.

 

My advisor (who had rebuilt several Esprit engines) told me that, but I didn't believe. 😣

[Barrykearley]

Keep pumping the oil in. Watch the level on the dipstick.

what I saw and found was that once it was primed - the pump would spill oil everywhere. Turning over at that point yielded oil from the pump. Kept it turning over pumping back into the filler cap

2 minutes ago, CarBuff said:

When we refreshed our engine, we needed to actually start it to obtain oil pressure.

 

My advisor (who had rebuilt several Esprit engines) told me that, but I didn't believe. 😣

Ffs - don’t do that - no oil  circulation = big expensive bill.

the pick up pipe to the pump is massive - and will only pull oil up if the pump 8s actually primed with oil or graphogen grease

[eeyoreish]

I’ve pumped in about a litre with the 12v pump until it wouldn’t pump in any more and stalled. 

Presumably pressured up in the gallery?

Spun it over for approx 1.5 mins and seeing no movement in the tapped in pipe at all

What next? More cranking? Something else?