AMC 360- low oil pressure

89wrangler

89wrangler

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Joined
Oct 22, 2005
Location
Bostic,NC
I rebuilt may 360 last spring, .30 over, pistons, rings, bearings, timing chain/gears, oil pump, heads rebuilt blah blah.... Runs awsome, no leaks, no smoke. However, after it warms up, at idle the oils pressure on my manuel guage drops down to 3-5psi
Is there anything that will correct this? New oil pump? I have seen some things such as increase spring pressure, New housing, but is there a real fix. Any help appreciated.
Steve
 
89wrangler said:
I rebuilt may 360 last spring, .30 over, pistons, rings, bearings, timing chain/gears, oil pump, heads rebuilt blah blah.... Runs awsome, no leaks, no smoke. However, after it warms up, at idle the oils pressure on my manuel guage drops down to 3-5psi
Is there anything that will correct this? New oil pump? I have seen some things such as increase spring pressure, New housing, but is there a real fix. Any help appreciated.
Steve
Click to expand...
check out http://www.bulltear.com/ site. great info. you may need to decrease gear clearance. I don't want to give any instruction because can't remember exact procedure. Also change to 20W-50 also helps.
 
Try putting in a bottle of lucas oil stabilizer as a replacement for a quart of oil at the next oil change. I did this to my buddies f-150 that would drop down to where the light would come on at idle. Lucas solved his problem. It also slowed the oil consumption of my 22r to a quart every 5k instead of a quart every 2500 or so.
 
A new timing chain cover IS the "real fix"... still cheaper than all the fluff/flash of machining the oilpump area for "hi-flo" (dodge) gears... Make sure the bypass isn't hung open (chunk of RTV/trash and bleeding it off.

My old 304 was that way (other than worn slap out) and the rebuild I put in had lower warm idle pressure than I liked. Pulled the oilpump cover and lapped it with 220grit paper & WD40 on a sheet of glass (finished with 400grit) for decent improvement. Later, I threw a couple washers under the spring in mine... on 10w40 80# cold (plenty of leaks now! :rolleyes: ) and 15-20# warm...
 
Thanks all,
Ordered new cover, oil filter adapter without bypass, and pump kit. Hopefully this will correct the issue.
Steve
 
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