Check your oil pressure!
 

Guys/Gals, I know oil pressure and spun bearings seem to plague our TBSS' but, not sure if many of you know just how bad the oil pressure gets.

My gauge has always seemed to read low compared to my other LS vehicles so I logged my oil pressure using EFILive the other day and WOW was I surprised.

Warm idle is around 30psi(logged), 38-40(gauge)
Hot idle after spirited driving 22psi(logged), 35(gauge)
Cruise 40psi(logged/gauge)
WOT 54psi before I topped oil up(logged), 45psi(gauge)

The worst part is that sometimes under heavy acceleration I saw the logged pressure drop to as low as 17psi. This seems to happen under very heavy accel only above say 3500 rpm or so. Once it was at like 25psi at 6200rpm. :sigh:

I checked my oil on the dipstick and it was at the bottom of the cross hatch area so I added a little over a quart to bring it up to maybe just a hair past the top. This has helped with the dips in pressure under heavy accel but, it is still too low imho. It won't dip below 30psi now and doesn't do it as much as it was before topping off. My WOT pressure doesn't go above 45 psi now though where before it would at least get to 54 or so.

So, this is mainly an announcement I'm making to fellow TBSSers to log that pressure if you can. If you can't at least top the oil up.

Also, I know from reading on some other TBSS boards that some fixes(oil pan) are being worked on but, I haven't really seen any results yet.

If you have any experience with this and have had some luck by changing oil weights or something else please post up.

After logging oil pressure with EFILive, I'm convinced the factory gauge is completely unreliable.

Factory gauge shows 1 tick left of 45 when I'm idling with hot oil. Logging shows mid 20s!

My results were similar to yours John:

Hot idle 1 minute: 25.5 to 27.8 psi @ 630 rpms
50 mph 1 minute cruise: 42.4 to 45.3 psi @ 2450 rpms
WOT run form 0 to 85 mph: 19.1 to 50.5 psi !!!

Under hardest acceleration in 1st gear, oil pressure dropped to the low of 19psi @ 5000 rpms. Pressure stayed mostly in the 20s - 30s even through the 1st/2nd shift. Pressure only started climbing back into the 40s-50 range when speeds got above 60mph and the acceleration started to 'plane out'. Factory gauge never went further than one notch from 45psi. :bang:

It seems like the oil pressure issues are worst when the torque and acceleration are highest. Front sump oil pan design problem?

Oh yeah, only 1200 miles on the odometer so far.

holy bejesus....WOW. Imagine that corporate meeting.

guy 1: I don't know, we have spent millions on this motor.
guy 2: What do you suggest?
guy 3: Let's not put oil pressure gauges in the truck
guy4: No...uhm, how about if we just sub out the dashes to the same supplier Ford uses. I am sure they'll read higher than really are. The public won't completely blame us. Besides, who is gonna get these things past 58lbs on the MAF any way.
guy 1: Cool.
guy 2: Sounds great to me.
guy 3: I am all about short meetings, consider it done. I have a hooker coming up in about an hour anyway.

hookers? somebody say hookers? :P

guy 1: Hey, lets take the money we saved on R&D and pay out extra bonuses!

guy 3: OOH Joe...errr I mean Guy 4, let's skip that dirty skank you call a hooker, go down to Charlies....errr I mean Strip Joint 1 and use left over money to fly our coporate jets to that stupid ass hand out meeting next thursday in DC.

Fixed that for ya. :sigh:

damn i cant see oil press on hpt :bang:,guess
i could log it on the dashhawk.
whats the oil temp when you logged this??
billy at RPM is doing new oil pans for us,2wd and awd
http://www.tbssowners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21379
http://www.tbssowners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21633

Yeah, I am waiting to see the results of the oil pans, so far I haven't seen any.

I did not log oil temp but, will add that to my PID list for tomorrow.

ya ill check mine on the DH tommorrow as well,its cold as $&!+ here tho lol and it takes FOREVER to get oil temps above 200*.
your in CA rite koonerman??

Nope, Maryland. It'll be in the single digits here tomorrow morning. I have oil temp added to my PID list now.

Can external inputs be added to the DH or just the OBDII stuff?

I'm not sure what my oil temps were, but I had already driven 45 minutes in traffic and freeway before I started checking oil pressure.

The LS2 engines run lower pressure then the trucks have. I actually use Mobil 1 15/50 full synthetic, I am also in a very moderate climate. I have seen LS2's run as little as 10 psi even in the car platforms with a different oil pan. The LS2 does not have priority main oiling. You can run a blueprinted melling pump and get a little more pressure.

You have to watch that the PCV on the back of the drivers side head is not sucking up oil on hard acceleration. If this is happening and you dont watch your level you will be in trouble. I actually cap that PCV off or run a catch can on it so you can watch how much oil is being pulled from there. I currently run dual passenger side valve covers and push in style breathers. This has completely cured the issues.

I have some very hard miles on my forged LS2 and it has been holding together great. I think that it is best to use a 10/30 in the winter and 15/50 in the summer. This will help with the thermal breakdown.

I've seen others mentioning the melling pump, and may add that to a future mod list. My main concern is having such low oil-pressure at high rpms. I've read countless threads talking about bearing failure. I'd like to be proactive if possible. If the best we can do is a melling 10296 pump and possibly the custom oil pan, then so be it.

Thanks for the info Joe! When I installed my TVS, my TBSS had 600 miles on the odometer. Upon pulling the intake off, there was A LOT more oil around the gaskets and in the intake runners than I would have expected. A catch can is definitely on my list.

What your take on mixing oils of different viscosities? Like a blend of Mobil-1 10/30 and 15/50. For that matter, is 15w50 too thick to run on a low-mile stock motor?

I wont try to do a blend in mine but we also dont see any real cold temps. You may be able to run a blend in the winter and straight 15/50 in the summer. I really like the Mobil-1 15/50 and would use it even in a stock engine in the summer months. It is a full synthetic so it isn't as thick as you may think.

I have 5w30, 10w30, and 15w50 here. I think it's too cold here right now to go with the 15w50 straight so I guess I'm going to put the 10w30 in.

I bought the 5 qt containers so if I need a little to top it off I'll probably use the 15w50 for that.

I am going to log some of my other vehicles too to make sure the gauges aren't WAY off like this TBSS.

Also, the oil temp reading from the computer is an estimated temperature. The PID even says estimated. The actual temp PID just reads -40 so it's not used. BigTex and I were talking earlier trying to figure out where a temp sensor was for the oil...none that we could think of. lol

My ESTIMATED temps never went over 228F but, does that really mean anything? I kinda have my doubts.

ok i got mine up to around 210* and the lowest i saw was 23psi to a high of 55psi.i forgot and put royal purple in itlast time i changed the oil about 2K miles ago.i run 5w30 and have never really thought about running anything different. i think when it warms up ill run 10w30.

interesting stuff here guys :judge:

I've never believed the oil pressure or temperature gauge on these trucks. They seem more like idiot lights. My oil pressure gauge always reads a hair over 40 psi. I didn't know you can monitor oil pressure with EFILive. What PID is it?

Alright, I changed the oil today. I put in a 5 qt jug of Mobil1 10w30 and in order to get it to the top of the cross hatch on the dipstick tube I had to add almost 2 qts of M1 15w50 that I had. I didn't want to put that much in but, I didn't buy anymore 10w30. lol

Pressure seems a tiny bit better but, not much. Filling it way up to the top of the cross hatch seems to have helped the dips in pressure a lot. On one WOT blast from a dig this evening pressure dropped to 36psi around 2700rpm but, recovered quickly and was at 45psi by 3400. It climbed to a high of 54psi on that run.

GM.ENGOILP is the PID in EFILive. :)

anybody have a cross cut of these oil pans? Bad pan design?...all these probs are assoicated with heavy acceleration. Maybe weld a baffle or two in there?

I shoulda took a picture of the pan when I had the front end jacked up today. What a crazy ass setup under there. lol Evidently the pickup for the oil pump is in the front so under heavy accel it can become uncovered. :(

I have nearly 7 qts in there now and it seems to be decent. GM calls for 6 in the manual.

I would like to try the new oil pan and pickup that is available for the 2WD TBSS's. This is the same pan as the SSR and both AWD and 2WD TBSS's

The front sump is a terrible design. I also run almost 7 quarts in mine and cures the hard launch problem. This is only a band-aid for now. I hope the new pan works out for us.

I will be swapping engines in June/July and will use the new pan then.

Well, I am pretty satisfied with the 7qts as a fix for the extremely low dips in pressure on hard launches for now. Hopefully the TVS 1900 doesn't aggravate the problem. :jest:

I still wouldn't mind a little more pressure up high but, the 10w30/15w50 mix in there now gets to 52psi at WOT so I guess that ain't too bad.

I hope the new pan helps too, swapping engines would be a perfect time to slap it on. :)

My 2006 TBSS spun a rod bearing back in November of 2006 and I remember back then talking about the oil pan design causing oil pressure problems. I'm really worried about this now on my 08 TBSS seeing as it 60fts 1.62 on motor so it's really pushing the first 30ft, I bet it's sucking the pump dry. :(

Thanks for the post!:D

Back to the top . . .

Does anyone else have any results logging their oil pressure during a hard launch? I'm curious to see if any others have the same symptoms...

Yes I'm also interested in this problem. I have recently been thinking of purchasing one of these but after reading this thread its kind of deterring me since this is a fairly intense problem i would hate to buy one of these things and roll a bearing. Please keep us updated.

I've seen this issue again now that the blower is installed. Acceleration is MUCH harder now and this ugly little issue popped up again. :(

You guys aughta just buy the L92 oil pump. I just put one in my truck and went from 35PSI hot idle to 50 psi hot idle. Anything north of 2800 RPM's is 80+ psi. It's designed just like the melling 10296 but half the price. I got mine from lingenfelter with o-ring for only like 90 shipped.

Most of the problem is the crappy front sump oil pan design I think. :(