I finally got around to hooking up a manual guage to my ARI 3.4 and took it out on the highway, once the car gets warmed up as I press down on the gas the oil pressure still drops 5-10 lbs. maybe 15 ,so there is nothing wrong with my digital guage, which is to bad because I was really hoping that is what it was. The pressure also still drops down to about 20 psi when idiling... There have also been some noises developing around 2300 rpm which weren't there before, although this engine has always been kind of noisy... The main bearings and the valve in the oil pump are the 2 things that control oil pressure. My dad explains to me that when you step on the gas the pistons in turn push down harder on the crankshaft which puts pressure on the main bearings if the Main Bearings are bad the it lets oil through and the pressure drops. Every time I talk to Dave at ARI he seems to want to get off the phone quickly and explains away the problem first it was " your oil guage is probably off" when I tlod him about the manual guage he was like "well what kind of manual guage was it" hell man i don't know, I just know that oil pressure isn't supposed to go down when you accelerate! I'm not trying to give ARI a bad rep but I'm starting to get pissed off, they're helpful and all but this engine just dosen't feel right. Dave told me to take the car down and they will listen to it and what not and that I can pull the engine and they'll look at it but I'm afraid he'll say theres nothing wrong with it when I know there is. Besides this is my daily driver, and I'm not the greatest mechanic I can't just have an engine out in a day! Sorry I guess I'm venting. Any other ideas on what I should do? Im about to just take my losses, drain my savings and go buy a crate 3.4 from GM, or maybe a used one... how cheap can I get one of those? Man i don't know what to do...

Will

Cam bearing clearence also affects oil pressure. Did you buy the shortblock/longblock from Dave? Oil pressure should definately not go down when you accelerate. Sounds like your between a rock and a hard place.
If you want to keep the ARI engine, seems your only choice is to take the engine to Dave, or maybe drive down to Grandview and have him take a drive. Course, he won't pull the engine for free.
Maybe ask him if he would come up to St. Joe and take a drive? Try working with him and see if you can reach a compromise.
If you could get a second opinion from a mechanic in your area, it would prolly help your case. I wish you well....Paul

[This message has been edited by Paul Prince (edited 01-26-2004).]

I bought the long block from them, I know you have done a lot of business with them before, I can pull the engine, I just don't want to unless I have to. Thanks for the help..
Will

quote Originally posted by will_p: I bought the long block from them, I know you have done a lot of business with them before, I can pull the engine, I just don't want to unless I have to. Thanks for the help.. Will

If you bought the long block from them with heads installed, then I would argue with Dave to repair it at his expense, he put the bearings in, as long as you properly broke in the cam, the fault is theirs. IMO............Paul

Do you mean take the car down and ask him to take out the engine himself and repair whatever is wrong? We broke in the cam by taking the car up to about 3000 rpm for about 10 min. Is there anything else you are supposed to do? other than drive the car easy and what not? again thanks for the help. We also pre-lubricated the engine or whatever you call it by turning the crankshaft manually a few times.

Will

[This message has been edited by will_p (edited 01-28-2004).]

Just be really careful, and think about what you say to the ARI people. Keep it friendly, so that you will have a good chance of getting them to make it good for you.
DM

quote Originally posted by will_p: Do you mean take the car down and ask him to take out the engine himself and repair whatever is wrong? We broke in the cam by taking the car up to about 3000 rpm for about 10 min. Is there anything else you are supposed to do? other than drive the car easy and what not? again thanks for the help. We also pre-lubricated the engine or whatever you call it by turning the crankshaft manually a few times. Will

Yea to properly prelube it, you should remove dist. and insert an oil pump drive shaft into oil pump. Then with an electric drill, rotate pump until you see oil coming out pushrods onto rockers. I usually do it for 10 minutes. Cam break in sounds good. I think you will prolly have to take the engine out, because ARI didn't install it.............Paul

The 2.8's can't be preoiled with just the pump drive shaft, the distributor housing has to be in place as well. That's because one of the two main oil galleries intersects the distributor hole and without the shaft the oil will not build enough pressure to move oil through the lifters to the pushrods. At least that was my experience. I just put the driver through an old distributor housing and preoiled mine that way. Also, on the cam break in 3k RPM sounds a bit high, though I'm not sure that it was necessarily detrimental to the cam. In any case only the lifters and cam lobes have a risk of failure from improper break-in and neither will significantly affect oil pressure. If you've verified oil pressure with a known good mechanical guage then your next option would be to change the oil pump. If that doesn't do it then there are bearing clearance problems for sure.

JazzMan

i thought proper cam break in procedure was 1500 to 2500 rpm for 20 minutes. moving up and down the rpm range so the lifters rotate and seat.

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Yes, that's the preferred, even required method. The main reason for maintaining RPM is to keep oil flow to the cam lobes while they wear in to the lifter faces. Too low of RPM and you lose oil flow, too high and you risk damaging the cam lobes and lifters from excessive friction while they're breaking in. The moly paste you put on the lobes during assembly is only to lube the lobes and lifters for the second or two it takes to get oil flow in a new engine.

JazzMan

[This message has been edited by JazzMan (edited 01-29-2004).]