I'm in desperate need of advice. Let me start by giving you a complete history. 2008 R56 110k miles. I bought the car with 55K, at 62 k I replaced the timing chain and tension and have changed oil and filter RELIGIOUSLY every 5K using either mobil1 or Valvoline with a Mann or K&N Filter ever since. At 100k my clutch fork broke so replaced the clutch. At 110K I parked in my garage. I went to start it a day later and it cranked but no start. I take it to my repair shop, Spark is fine but I have a near total loss of compression on all cylinders. Head comes off a lot of carbon, fill chambers with fuel and it pours out the valves. Head re-worked, then turbo had play replaced that, (Borg Warner and turbo oil line from ECS) . Did the hpfp and vacuum pump, vanos gear and actuator, oil filter housing gaskets. All back together seems to run great until at operating temp at idle the oil light come on. Change the switch - no joy same issue. I don't know the actual pressure at idle yet I NEVER had an oil pressure issue prior to this rebuild. I read some where that a spring could be missing in the oil filter housing and cause this is that true? He did replace all the gaskets in the housing. I find it hard to believe that an oil pressure issue would just appear, after it being worked on unless something caused it I don't abuse the car, I was driving it about 100 miles a day mostly highway miles and have been changing the oil/filter like clockwork. Please Help.

 

did you check if the oil is reaching the filter and then the top end? maybe the oil pump life expectancy reached its limit? check that spring plunger in the OFH.

 

Hey ACESII, sorry to hear about your low oil pressure problem. Check out this thread.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ht-solved.html

In my case it was the oil pump.

Chief K

 

So I bring my problem child to another shop. Get a call "you definitely have low pressure, at 1000 RPM it is 8PSI" so I ask to pull the pan and check for pick up obstruction. The call back "nothing obstructing what do you want to do" Asked to check bearings for excessive wear. Get a call back 3 hours later "Car is fixed" So I'm elated but obviously I ask why. "We pulled the valve cover to check camshaft bearings, 8 of the 10 caps were only finger tight. Pulled the caps, camshaft had only minor scratches, no problem. Reinstalled and re-torqued, idle PSI is 22 lbs. WTF!!!! Well I will be paying a visit to the previous shop that did the head work,,,,,,

 

8-12 PSI at idle is the spec, but it should rise well over 8 PSI at 1000 RPM. When I put my new oil pump in my N12, I connected a direct pressure reading gauge to the oil pressure switch port; I had about 40 PSI at idle. If your engine has close to or over 100K miles, I'd replace the oil pump. I'm reading more and more reports of these pumps catastrophically failing near or over the 100K mile mark.

The torque spec for those cam bearing caps is 88 in lbs. Wonder if the shop used blue loctite. I did.

Newtis.info doesn't list the oil pressure spec for the N14 or N12 anymore (not that I can find anyway), but here's some info from Pelican Parts:

https://www.pelicanparts.com/techart...eplacement.htm

 

mkov re-read my posts to include my original ...

They (new garage) confirmed low oil pressure by putting a mechanical gauge on the sensor port, so they dropped the pan to see if there were any obstructions, no obstruction. Pulled the valve cover to check the cam bearings low and behold 8 out of 10 were loose. The PREVIOUS garage didn't torque the cam bearings when the put on the head. THAT cause my low oil pressure. Thank God my cam wasn't damaged much