Well this is the second time this has happened but this time I think Im screwed

About 2 years ago my original battery finally started going out in my 07, if i didnt drive it everyday it wouldnt have enough charge to start it the next morning. Sure enough one morning it barely started but when it did the oil pressure gauge was at ZERO and the oil warning message came on! I couldnt imagine how I couldnt have any oil pressure since thats mechanical but sure enough the car would down and died after a couple seconds. I thought oh crap, did I just sieze my motor with no oil pressure! But I put in a new battery and it started right back up just fine with the gauge reading plenty of oil pressure again, yay! So i figure for some reason the low batt was not powering up the oil pressure gauge for some reason.

Fast forward 2 years to today, I havent driven my car around since Sat and I left my V1 on so it drained the juice, dammit, jump my car and it starts right up, but the oil pressure is again at ZERO and the oil warning comes on. At this point Im thinking this is EXACTLY what happened last time and I DO have oil pressure the batt just doesnt have enough juice. I drive it around the block, oil pressure gauge is still not going up, now Im freaking out so I pull it back in, pull out the battery and replaced it with a brand new fresh one this afternoon. Sure enough the car starts right up, oil pressure comes right back up, ta-da!

I go on about my day but as Im driving the car starts making a slight scraping sound, it starts getting louder and now my oil pressure is dropping!! it finally hits zero and the my cars about to die! WTF!

So I get the car towed back home and Im clueless, is there any reason at all the oil pressure is controlled electrically? I think my motor is screwed now but I need to know why both times this happened and it was clearly connected to my battery/charging system??

HALP!!!!

 

forgot a few details, its got 70k on it now, mods are cam/headers/tune but have had them on for at least the last 50k with no probs. checked to oil, still plenty and it still looks pretty clean with no metal/bearing material, at least on the dipstick, will change oil/filter tonite.

 

Take a sample of the oil and have it analyzed. See what the answer is first. If your oil pressure was dying you shuld stop right away.

Good luck

Avalon

 

hmm, thanks but an oil analysis is not going to have an answer for why I dont have oil pressure, or why this seems to be connected with my starting/charging system. I was hoping maybe this was something that someone else here had come across but I guess Im just going to have to find a way to hook a mechanical oil pressure gauge up and try that next.

 

Cut the oil filter filter open and see whats inside. Your sender is electric and that scraping sound then loss of oil pressure????? Sounds like to different senerios. Although perhaps you alternator is failing and thats the noise you heard. That would explain the electrical gremlins as well. Let us know

 

Grit your teeth, open the hood and start her up. Check if the oil pressure has returned. Try to determine where the noise is coming from. If you don't have oil pressure you should also have lifter clatter, they bleed down fast without oil pressure. An engine will run pretty long without oil pressure. As for oil sample, waste of time and money. I have seen engines that have failed where you could see the part numbers on the pieces and the oil sample still tested normal. Noise coming from the engine bay then oil pressure falls? Did you also experience a power loss as well?

 

The series of events that happened to me with my vette are almost unbelievable. I'll try to make it as short as possible to not bore anyone.
On a short trip to play in a golf tournment my Y2k coupe starting losing oil pressure according to the gauge so I pull over and stop to check things out. Oil level was fine, just had it changed along with a new sending unit, so I start her up again pressure goes up then drops to ZERO and I hear a distinct tap and a miss in the engine. Shut her down again and start to get real concerned with the miss and tappet noise so I call a friend and have her flatbedded to my local dealership. He dropped it off on friday night after they closed. Monday morning I'm there when they open and they tell me they will call when they get to it because they know I want to be there when they start it. Three days go by and no call so I call and then they tell me they are swamped and might get to it next week I tell them no way and start making other arrangements to try to find out what damage might have occured and what I need to do to find out. I had to wait untill today to get someone to look at it and by then all kind of scenarios were playing out in my head Still with me because this is where the weird part comes in. Bright and early this morning I have her towed to a guy who came highly recommended because he has been doing engine rebuilds for years. We start her up and I'm thinking the worse but the oil pressure comes up to 60lbs then drops to around 50lbs and holds but the tapping and miss are still present. We let her idle and reach operating temperature with oil pressure gauge ok but fluctuating more than normal. He listens to the tapping noise and tells me that it is not an valve tapping and that it sounds more like spark jumping to him. I kill it and he reaches down in the engine and says try it now with a s@#t eating grin on his face. I start it up NO MISS NO TAPPING JUST BORLAS GROWLING OIL PRESSURE PERFECT I said what did you do? He said I put your plug wire back on I said you mean a damn spark plug wire caused all this . I felt stupid for not checking but he told me the way it played out with the plug wire coming off, losing oil pressure ,loss of power I did the right thing by not driving it.
He said the spark plug wire must have been jumpimg fire and the oil pressure gauge was the only one affected which in itself was just weird. He said I didn't owe him anything but I gave him 100 bucks for his time thanked