Lost oil pressure after cam install....HELP!
Thread Starter
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Cruiser
Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 230
Likes: 0
From: Hebron, Indiana
what is your oil pressure running at? your engine is going to behave differently with different cams. if its getting hotter, your oil would get thinner faster and your pressure will drop with that. after doing the 107 with the 555 cams, my oil pressure behaves nothing like it used to as a 96. quick call to jamie and he allayed all my fears. but it can still be nerve racking when you look at the gauge and where it used to read 32 is now reading 10-15......
NO oil pressure on gauge and a lot of valve clatter.The rotors are installed as per the service manual and torqued in sequence. Both sets of rotors are riding on the flats and fully seated. When I remove the outer cover I see oil coming back into the oil pump area, so that makes me think the scavenge part is working.
This is starting to look like one of those things that gives a man "experience".
Seasoned HDF Member
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 20,616
Likes: 4,440
From: anacoco, la
i guess i should have clarified some on this. it doesn't always run at that pressure, but does drop down to that when it is really hot out. and we've had a couple of days that have hit over 90* here already. when the temp is lower, the pressure stays up.
yeah, that would be definitely not be right.....
Cruiser
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 106
Likes: 0
From: Scranton, Arkansas
How long have you run the motor, days, minutes, sec? Have you checked to make sure oil sending unit is working, might need to screw in a mechanical oil gauge into sending unit hole check for true pressure. I got some trash or something in my oil sending unit when I did mine, gauge acted weird as heck for a while, doing fine now.
Thread Starter
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Cruiser
Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 230
Likes: 0
From: Hebron, Indiana
How long have you run the motor, days, minutes, sec? Have you checked to make sure oil sending unit is working, might need to screw in a mechanical oil gauge into sending unit hole check for true pressure. I got some trash or something in my oil sending unit when I did mine, gauge acted weird as heck for a while, doing fine now.
Larry
Cruiser
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 106
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From: Scranton, Arkansas
I agree with the valve chatter thing except it may chatter several minutes even with oil pressure. We had to turn my bro's '11 over for several minutes without the spark plugs in to get the low oil pressure light to go off, long enough to where I was beginning to wonder if it was going to go off. After we got the light to go off, we stuck the plugs in and started it and it still took a quite a few secs to build oil pressure. The mechanical oil gauge is a much better indicator of oil pressure IMO, you could see it better even with engine turning over with out plugs.
Road Warrior
Joined: Jun 2009
Posts: 1,943
Likes: 3
From: NYC
I just did one of these and is an art moreso than a science. Did you take the pump apart to clean it out? I found sludge in mine and can see that if you get enough of it in there the inner and outer gears will spin together resulting in no oil pressure.
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Thread Starter
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Cruiser
Joined: Sep 2007
Posts: 230
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From: Hebron, Indiana
That is a possibility. I did wipe everything down with paper towels. Maybe something off of them jammed the rotors, but I did have it apart twice to look see so I am baffled at this point.
Tourer
Joined: May 2010
Posts: 450
Likes: 2
If you just had that camchest apart, it will take more then a few seconds to show oil pressure on the gauge, and to get enough oil to where it needs to go to stop the valve chatter. The valve chatter may not stop even after you have oil pressure because your pushrods may not be adjusted like they should be, have seen this more then once. Didyou use assembly lube when putting everything together? Did you use it everywhere like on the pushrods where they hit rocker arms, over the rockers where they scrub the valve stems, basically everywhere moving metal touches other metal?
If you did use assembly lube liberally, I would not be afraid to start the motor and let it run for 20 seconds, half a minute. Even raising the idle to 1500 or so to give the pump a chance to do its job.
When I put cams in my 88" it took 15-20 seconds for the motor to sound right and that was using a whole hell of a lot of lube when putting it together. On normal start ups the bike takes 3-4 seconds to sound right when its cold.
If you did use assembly lube liberally, I would not be afraid to start the motor and let it run for 20 seconds, half a minute. Even raising the idle to 1500 or so to give the pump a chance to do its job.
When I put cams in my 88" it took 15-20 seconds for the motor to sound right and that was using a whole hell of a lot of lube when putting it together. On normal start ups the bike takes 3-4 seconds to sound right when its cold.