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Today leaving dog park oil gauge showed zero pressure. Cracked a turbo oil feed line and showed flow. On short drive home oil pressure climbed to 18 PSI. Shut off engine and immediately turned key to on position, gauge swept and came to rest at 18 PSI. Suspect clogged sensor. Second opinion please.
Start by pulling the intake and relocating the sender to the driver side valve cover/ fuel rail. Add a gauge and the next time it fails you will know whether the engine has oil pressure or not.
Mine went both ways. First time it pegged at 130psi, 2nd time was alarming, because after sitting all Winter, it showed Zero on first startup in the Spring!! So I hooked up a gauge to double check, and verified sender was junk. The OEM sender is one of the few OEM parts I'd recommend NOT buying!!! I installed a 'medium quality' sender from O'Reilly years ago. It's already outlasted any OEM sender I've ever had. However, it does read about 5lbs less than a gauge showed, so, I guess it's better than showing more pressure than there actually is.......
Mine went both ways. First time it pegged at 130psi, 2nd time was alarming, because after sitting all Winter, it showed Zero on first startup in the Spring!! So I hooked up a gauge to double check, and verified sender was junk. The OEM sender is one of the few OEM parts I'd recommend NOT buying!!! I installed a 'medium quality' sender from O'Reilly years ago. It's already outlasted any OEM sender I've ever had. However, it does read about 5lbs less than a gauge showed, so, I guess it's better than showing more pressure than there actually is.......
Similar experience here. My car has blown two "new" oil pressure sensors just weeks after installation. I only had access to the silver ones at the time. I now have another silver one in the car, but I have a brass one on hand, as well as the relocation kit.
It's better to have them pin at the top vs. at the bottom (or fluctuate at lower psi). When they pin the needle at the top the car will be functional without throwing bells and chimes at you non stop. When they faulter and drop to zero it's a pain in the *** to get the car home.
I have had both experiences. One is a bigger pain in the butt than the other. Getting the sensor swapped out in the garage without removing the intake isn't too difficult. I've done it both ways. With the correct tools (sensor socket and jointed socket extension) it's a bit tedious to do without intake removal due to lack of access (especially with bigger hands), but the sensor swap can be done in about 30 minutes.
These oil pressure sensors suck. Just replacedine with a new ac Delco sensor. Reads 80lbs. For a few minutes it was reading 18 lbs and going to 40 lbs. Thinking of just moving the sensor to the front of the engine near the oil pump.
Last edited by C5MSG2004Vert; Sep 5, 2021 at 11:27 AM.
Start by pulling the intake and relocating the sender to the driver side valve cover/ fuel rail. Add a gauge and the next time it fails you will know whether the engine has oil pressure or not.
I'm on my third or fourth sensor on my 03. Tried different brands. All fail.
oil pressure sensor
