LT oil pump drive
Thread Starter
Drifting
Joined: Oct 2003
Posts: 1,405
Likes: 4
From: Lorena Texas
LT oil pump drive
So I'm at the track Friday and on lap three the oil pressure light comes on and stays on. Got the pan and intake off and heres the culprit. Been running a Melling HV pump and never did like the excessive pressure. Will go back to a stock pump. Does anyone know if a stroger gear can be installed on the drive and if so who makes it? If you don't run a low oil pressure light I highly recommend it.
http://s517.photobucket.com/albums/u...t=DSCN2497.jpg
Thanks
http://s517.photobucket.com/albums/u...t=DSCN2497.jpg
Thanks
Melting Slicks
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 3,482
Likes: 196
From: folsom california
interestingly enough Chevy "Performance Parts" catalog lists one distributor gear, pn 10456413, for both small blocks and big blocks.
I agree you have a problem but absent some actual oil pump failure, your problem does not lie with a high volume oil pump. If high volumes were the problem, no chevy big block could function.
The old school solution is to drill a .030 inch hole in the oil pump drive housing oriented to spray oil onto the (distributor) drive gear and camshaft gear at the point that they mesh.
Shimming and taking out some of the excessively large amount of clearance between the drive gear and the oil pump drive gear housing doesn't hurt either.
What I suspect is that if you disassemble your oil pump, you will find the internal idler gear and the shaft it rides on to show evidence of inadequate lubrication. There is no forced lubrication of these parts, and while at low RPM this is not an issue, at sustained higher rpm it is an issue; the result, inadequate lubrication of the idler gear and the shaft it rides on, increased friction, drastically higher power needed to drive oil pump, oil pump drive gear and camshaft gear failure.
Again an old school solution is to drill a small hole through the idler gear so that when the two pump gears mesh together a small shot of oil is injected between the inside diameter of the gear and the shaft it rides on.
I agree you have a problem but absent some actual oil pump failure, your problem does not lie with a high volume oil pump. If high volumes were the problem, no chevy big block could function.
The old school solution is to drill a .030 inch hole in the oil pump drive housing oriented to spray oil onto the (distributor) drive gear and camshaft gear at the point that they mesh.
Shimming and taking out some of the excessively large amount of clearance between the drive gear and the oil pump drive gear housing doesn't hurt either.
What I suspect is that if you disassemble your oil pump, you will find the internal idler gear and the shaft it rides on to show evidence of inadequate lubrication. There is no forced lubrication of these parts, and while at low RPM this is not an issue, at sustained higher rpm it is an issue; the result, inadequate lubrication of the idler gear and the shaft it rides on, increased friction, drastically higher power needed to drive oil pump, oil pump drive gear and camshaft gear failure.
Again an old school solution is to drill a small hole through the idler gear so that when the two pump gears mesh together a small shot of oil is injected between the inside diameter of the gear and the shaft it rides on.
Is the gear a soft metal that suppose to wear?
