hello all geting my 355 back together. Had low oil psi problems at least thats what my gauge said never had a chance to check do to my lower timing gear/timing chain breaking. well got a new hp pump and what not but im priming it with a 1/2 drill at 800 rpm or so and only seeing 15psi and no oil to my valve train. just a lot of oil dumping out of the hole right behind where the oil pump drive would go. Im guessing the hole is to oil the gears on the cam/oil pump drive. Not sure if that's right. turning the drill up to a much higher rpm and only see 27psi. and so much oil coming out of that hole it comes up into the lifter valley. is this right? would a distributor or oil pump drive block some of that oil flow forcing more up to the lifters? any help or reassurance would be great.

PS. im using a oil pump drive rod with a bolt welded to it as my priming tool.

thanks guys.

 

That is why they sell priming tools with a bushing to go in the bore in the block. Once the oilpump drive is installed it will restrict that "leak" and oil will go elsewhere.

 

You need to spin the motor over by hand a little bit to get oil up top. The lifters have a hole in the side of them and some of them won't be lined up to receive oil the way they sit. Don't be so critical of the top end on initial startup. The bottom end and camshaft need the oil right away. As long as you assembled the top end with lube on the rockers and pushrod ends they will be fine for a few seconds until it fires.

Sidenote- running a good oil filter such as a NAPA gold, will allow your engine to have a little more oil pressure. A cheap pos filter like a Purolator classic becomes a restriction even with the bypass fully opened.

 

Ok thanks a lot I guess I gota go get the right priming tool. Thanks for your help guys I thought it was ok but didn't want to find out I dad problems when its in the car.

 

ok so i got the "right tool" from vato zone now im geting 30ish psi on my low speed and 40ish at 800rpm so that seems good. but im still not geting all the lifters on my right bank to fill up. im keeping the oil psi around 35 and slowly turning the motor over by hand. where should the motor be for each lifter? lifters all the way down? all the way up? some where in the middle? thanks guys.

 

ok so same **** primed for another 10mis turning motor by hand. left bank lifter are good. hard as a **** star on Viagra. (can I say that on here?) all right bank lifters are collapsible they feel like there better then empty lifters but definitely not hard. I know i saw oil coming out of them or past them but not a hole lot. thinking it might have something to do with the vato zone tool not really sealing that great. but dont know if i should put the intake on and put the motor in or not yet. ugg

 

ok well i did some googling and I guess the distributor is used for an oil passage to the right bank of lifters. so since my cheapo tool didn't fit vary tight it aloud most of the oil to bypass the right lifter bank. so just in case anyone else has a similar problem. that's probably all it is.

 

I took these when replacing my cam, rod, and crank bearings in my LT1.

Here is the oil pump drive gear and it's position in the block....
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...e_gear_001.JPG
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...e_gear_002.JPG

Here is an unmodified SBC oil priming tool and it's position in the oil passages...
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...e_tool_001.JPG
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...e_tool_002.JPG

One of the problems is that the typical SBC priming tool positions the channel of the oiling groove in wrong position on the LT1. It's 0.250" too low. My Dad shifted the priming tool grooves up the shaft 0.250"(turned me two new snap ring grooves). This fixed the alignment problems.

Here is it mocked up 0.250" higher....
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...higher_001.JPG
http://www.ace1252.com/images/1996_L...higher_002.JPG

However, when it was all said and done, I never even used it. I pre-lubed everything with oil when installing everything.... bearings, cam, crank, soaked lifters in oil, etc. It even sat for a month or two before firing it. Now I did "prime" it for a good 30 seconds with the starter before lighting it off(PCM fuse pulled so it would not fire...or was it IGN....not sure...I think it was PCM because I didn't want the injectors firing). Never had any problems.

 

thanks a lot for the pics. that shows some of the problems. yeah im just going to crank it tell I see oil psi hopefully some one else will see this post and not wast as much time as I did haha