high oil pressure !

[M D E]

Should I be worried that my oil pressure gauge reads 5 and heads into the red nearly all of the time ....The only time it drops to 3 to 4 is when at idle ....

[top-plumber]

I dont know the specifics of the oil ways on our cars but as a plumber certain rules apply. If I have a pipe with particular diameter and pump velocity when I reduce the pipe size the flow drops but the pressure rises. I suspect the same applies to oil and oil galleries. Possible blockage or faulty gauge maybe. Perhaps someone might correct

me.

[jimblob]

oil viscosity?

[Sir Paolo]

Pressure relief valve faulty?

[CarBuff]

Mismatched oil pressure gauge?

 

Our Federal Turbo came with a 5 bar OP gauge, later Lotus fitted a 7 bar gauge.

 

Additionally, the bolted-on wire terminals on the sending unit can cause the signal to read higher than normal if corroded. (If you mess with them, make sure you note the proper wire orientation before removal)

 

 

PS I'd look at the terminals as a warmed up engine should be 1.5 - 2 bar at idle.

Edited April 28, 2014 by CarBuff

[Mike6]

Likely to be the pressure relief valve which could be sticking. When was the oil last changed. Other than this idle pressure looks good and 5 at cold start would also be good but you would expect it to drop back when hot. 

[Vanya]

Mine is at 5 on a cold start and 2 when fully warm so there's another one for the statistics.

 

My gauge doesn't have any red region although I too was concerned when I noticed the gauge was so high up the scale.

 

On a related note, what's the oil temp gauge meant to read? Mine has never risen above 60 degrees and I suspect the gauge is faulty....

[910Esprit]

I'd wager the sender or gauge is faulty  - very unlikely a 9xx series oil pump could generate a genuine 3-4 bar at hot idle  (the oil pump is tiny and its a multi bearing engine) - If anyone pipes up to say theirs gets that... your gauge is faulty too!     

[M D E]

Many thanks for the replies ... Oil was changed last week with 20/50 ... Will check pressure release valve and wires on sender unit ... It used to drop to 4 when warmed up and at 3000rpm plus ...but after oil change its reading 5 going into the red ....

Edited April 29, 2014 by M D E

[mdw]

Mine is 5.5 on a cold start and 2.5 after half and hours run both at tick over.  This is at 1000 miles on a fully rebuilt engine.  I cant remember the service book specs but its well within them by a long way as you would expect.  That's using Valvoline racing as recommended by Lotusbits for their engine builds.  Might switch to Castrol edge after 5000 miles.

[Mike6]

Mark, Unless the na is  different from the turbo you cannot easily check the pressure valve as its integral with the pump housing. Does seem strange that oil pressure has changed since you completed an oil change. Check that you havent dislodged anything not that I can think of anything that would make pressure reading go up. Filter for instance - is it the correct one for the car.