all fixed. idle now 13.5-ish, 2000rpm 14.7v. Also changed the oil (4qts of 10W30 cheapo, 1.5qt of Rotella 5W40) and the spark plugs. First time I've ever changed a SBC spark plugs in under 30 minutes. Holy cow, you take all the crap out of the engine bay and it is stupid easy! oil pressure holds steady at 25psi at idle hot now. 60 cold, 45 at speed.
God I love this thing.
Use to be when cars/trucks had oil pressure gauges I use it as a signal that the oil is hot and I can get on it.
iceracer wrote: Use to be when cars/trucks had oil pressure gauges I use it as a signal that the oil is hot and I can get on it.
well, I'm also not used to a guage that is actually telling me what is really happening. I am more used to the OE gauges that are guestimates more than anything. Have to retrain the brain.
iceracer wrote: Use to be when cars/trucks had oil pressure gauges I use it as a signal that the oil is hot and I can get on it.
This is what I do in the Jeep since I haven't gotten around to wiring the oil temp gauge yet. Coolant temp shows 190+ and oil pressure is down to 18 or less at idle? It's warm enough to beat on it.
Put 150 miles on it yesterday. Had to buy gas to get home. Still getting 15mpg, oil pressure with the new oil never drops below 20psi at idle even at 80+* air temps. At speed 45psi at 2800rpm(62-ish mph).
Bobzilla wrote: Put 150 miles on it yesterday. Had to buy gas to get home. Still getting 15mpg, oil pressure with the new oil never drops below 20psi at idle even at 80+* air temps. At speed 45psi at 2800rpm(62-ish mph).
Sounds like it's all good then!
Sounds like a tight and healthy engine to me. EDIT: Tight enough the 30/40 blend you've got in there is probably unnecessary.
Thinking about this discussion. One of the things that helped maintain engine oil pressure in my mega-mileage TBI 350 was to drop the engine operating temp.
Instead of swapping the radiator, I just added a big True-cool brand 40K GVW transmission cooler with the in-line thermostat. I have it plumbed to run through the radiator, then the cooler, then back to the trans. I haven't towed with it, but after half an hour on the highway, I can still touch the outflow side of the cooler on the hottest summer day here in FL. The outflow side is only at about ambient temperature to the touch.
Instead of the transmission fluid transferring heat into the radiator, it's running cool enough to pull heat out of the radiator. It dropped my engine temps by quite a bit.
In reply to floatingdoc:
that would be great if I had an auto.
In reply to Bobzilla:
Yeah, might be! Not so effective for a manual transmission!
Although I do still need to change the trans fluid. Its the last fluid to change other than coolant. Brake fluid, rear diff, engine oil all flushed.
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