This one was scary... After I had an idler pulley fail, I noticed that my oil pressure was
reading low. I figured it was because we were driving slow on the way out of the trail and it would be
fine at road speed.
When we got on the road it was still reading low. I
was concerned, to say the least. Low oil pressure is almost always a sign of major
trouble and after what I went through with the idler pulley on the trail, I was not
looking forward to expensive engine repairs.
The oil pressure was all over the place but after eating
dinner in a restaurant, the reading was consistent and in line with what I considered
normal (about 50 p.s.i.) So I drove home without observing any more problems.
The next day I loaded up the family for a ride in the
country. I drove about five minutes and the oil pressure started reading low and
even dropping to zero. And worse yet, as we sort of coasted up a hill, to get to a
spot to pull over, I thought I heard knocking! This is not cool!
I shut it off and got out to look around under the hood.
Well that was about as productive as Super Man trying to see through lead. So
I started the Jeep up again and there was no noise. Now confused and concerned I
drove home and parked it. Later I started it up and the oil pressure was fine!
I decided that since I had not seen any other classic
symptoms of major engine failure (oil leak, high temps, power loss, blue smoke, engine
noise, or the sucking sound of a leaking wallet), it was probably the gauge, sending unit
or connections. I checked the oil just to make sure and it was full, even after
three months since the last change. OK, I', pretty sure it's not the
engine...
I bought and installed the oil pressure sending unit.
I discovered that the connector rotates around on the unit that I removed.
The new one has silicon sealant on the unit and the connector does not rotate.
I suspect that is one sign of the failure. When it was wet out, the unit
misreads; when it was dry it was fine...
| 10 |
56028 807AA |
SENDING UNIT, Oil Pressure |
We will see if the problem goes away. It was as
simple as sliding the lock on the connector to one side, squeezing the clip on the
connector, and carefully wiggling the connector off of the sending unit that is screwed
into a fitting next to the oil filter. Then screwing in the new sending unit.
