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4 Posts
I adjusted the valves on my '62 221 V8 and it runs pretty well now. Put new valve cover gaskets and change the oil. Everything seems okay (with the exception of the valve covers slowly leaking) but a bigger problem could be lingering just over the horizon...
Oil pressure...
Before I even got this car home it was running at about 30 psi on the highway doing 50 mph. After all the service we did on the car, it ran at about 50 psi on cold start. But as I was coming home from a joy ride earlier I saw the gauge drop down to 10 psi at idle! I let the car sit for 30 minutes and after that it started at about 23 psi at idle. I guess my question is, what is a normal safe oil pressure and could the 10 psi anomaly be a sign of trouble? I have suspicion that when I adjusted the rocker arms I loosened a lot of grime and carbon and that could be clogging the sump pump, or maybe the slow valve cover leak is the culprit?
Oil pressure...
Before I even got this car home it was running at about 30 psi on the highway doing 50 mph. After all the service we did on the car, it ran at about 50 psi on cold start. But as I was coming home from a joy ride earlier I saw the gauge drop down to 10 psi at idle! I let the car sit for 30 minutes and after that it started at about 23 psi at idle. I guess my question is, what is a normal safe oil pressure and could the 10 psi anomaly be a sign of trouble? I have suspicion that when I adjusted the rocker arms I loosened a lot of grime and carbon and that could be clogging the sump pump, or maybe the slow valve cover leak is the culprit?