XE oil problem

[cunit]

There doesn't seam to be oil getting to the cams in my XE, i've tied turning it over with the king lead out and ive also fired it up for a few seconds and the tappets are really noisey and there's no oil in the rocker cover when I take the cap off. So...
Is it possible for the oil pump to stop working with out actualy seizing up?
How many oil ways are there leading to the head? if one was blocked could it completly stop the oil?
Or is it possible the engine isn't picking it up from the sump? There's 4.5 litres of oil in the sump

Any ideas? :thumb:

[craig-nova]

the oil pick up in the sump are common to getting ****ed up lol try that. if it was the oil pump failing with low pressure surely the oil light wud b on.

[comptoncj]

could be the relief valve sticking open or as the other chap said a blocked pick up i had this problem with a baby xe in a corsa sport but unfortunatly i was goin down the a1 at the time and a big end spun whish resulted in a rebuild :(

[Rich]

Take the oil pressure releif valve out and make sure it can move freely and isnt stuck. Its a common problem. Have you just got it running after its been rebuilt or sitting for a while?

It may take a while to quieten down. As above make sure the oil pickup pipe isnt blocked.

[Lee H]

Also known of this happening if the O ring on the pickup pipe hasn't been replaced or has been left out completely when taking the pipe off to do a sump gasket change.

[cunit]

engines been sitting a while, just got it running.

I'll try the relief valve first them move onto the sump pick-up.

Is there some kind of mod for the XE relief valve, I seam to remember people talking about it a couple of years back?

cheers

[Lee H]

You can get a nylon relief valve from SBD, less prone to sticking.

[fennah]

id try getting an oil preasure swich off nova sr /gte / astra gte etc and set of clocks with oil preasure guage on it , easy to fit only one extra wire to run and will give u accurate idea of whats going on and piece of mind for the future

[cunit]

yeah its a gte so ive got the oil pressure gauge as standard, not sure how accurate/reliable it is though.

Just took out the relief valve, the bit at the end of the spring was stuck in the block a wee bit but don't if it was enough to cause problems. Will try fire it up tomorrow night.

If i need to take the sump off, is it possible with out removing the exhaust manifold?

[fennah]

dont think so becose you need to drop the sump down quite a bit to clear the pic up pipe , no harm in trying though might be lucky and be able to rotate it abit , but in worst case be prepared to drop the manafold

[ste porter]

my oil pump did this it cracked a tooth off the main gear locked the pump solid and the crank rounded the now locked gears in the oil pump so it would start and run still and that was a 500 mile old pump!