I have been having problems with erratic oil pressure reading & hadn't gotten around to replacing the sending unit yet, thinking that was the culprit. Tonight I started the bike up & the gauge went up & light went off as normal, then a few seconds later the gauge dropped to zero & the light came on. The engine sounded fine, no clattering or anything, I checked the wire connection & that seemed OK. What I'm wondering is if this is what would happen if the sending unit crapped out? I'm guessing this part has a high failure rate since the local dealer had 8 of them in stock! It was too late to pick one up tonight before they closed, hoping one of the expert mechs on here could tell me if I'm looking at the right fix, how about it Dawg or anyone else.

 

Back in 2004 I purchased a Screamin Eagle Electraglide. At about 1500 miles the cam plate and oil pump were replaced under warranty due to erratic oil pressure. The dealer hooked up a manual gage in place of the oil sending unit and said, yep, there is a problem. OK warranty, cost me nuttin so good to go. So I thought, still had the erratic pressure but be clear it was OK sometimes and then out of the blue dropped to nothing, then would bounce all over the place. No rhyme or reason but my red idiot light would not come on when the pressure showed low. Dealer replaced 3 sending units next, still had the problem, then we replaced the gage, still had the problem. So I make up and adapter so I can run the electric oil sending unit and a mechanical gage. Next time the electric gage in fairing goes nuts the mechanical one says all is fine. With the engine running I goto the sending unit and start pinching and wiggling the wires back toward the top, low and behold my electric gage starts twitching and reading all weird. OK end of story, from day one there was a bad wire in the harness all along, would make contact sometimes and not others and that would send the gage crazy. Dealer never found it, I ended up splicing the bad section and all was better from that point out. You may want to either have dealer or yourself hook up a mechanical gage to verify things. Good Luck!

PS: If I remember correctly, there are 2 wires to the sending unit, one is for the idiot light and the other is for the gage.

 

It's probably electrical as stated above. You have an 09 correct? There's been quite a bit of pinched wire issues on the newer bikes that I've seen/heard of. You haven't done any recent work in the cam chest or handlebars, etc have you?

 

My bike is a 2000 & I don't think it's electrical, not sure though, I'm running a fueling oil pump & haven't done anything inside the cam chest. About a month ago my oil pressure light came on but gauge was still reading good pressure, it stayed on for a while then flickered on & off for a little bit & then never bothered again until tonight. Last weekend the gauge would move around & read anywhere from 36# down to around 24#, it always read steady at idle around 10#. Going to try a sending unit tomorrow & hope that's the problem, thanks for the reply.

 

Still running the old tensioners?

 

Yes, stock tensioners.

 

Have you checked them recently to see that they are not failing and taking out your oil pump, etc?

 

No, but this problem has been going on for the last 3K miles or more, haven't heard any increase in noise from motor.

 

I'd still check them to be on the safe side. While in there check the oil relief valve in the camplate, might be a little sticky.

 

Install a mechanical gauge and verify. My previous egc had two factory sending units go bad in a year. I ignored it once I verified.