Fellow SOLers,
After many honey-do type jobs yesterday my wife decides we should take a
late afternoon ride in the Spit to unwind. I readily agree and we jump in,
crank up, and we're off. A few blocks from the house I take a cursory glance
at the oil pressure gauge and see, to my horror, it's reading 0, nil, nothing!
Oh, no! Look at the oil light, not on. Back to the gauge. It ain't moved.
Which do I believe? A third look at the gauge and I see a thin stream of
black liquid coming from behind the gauge, dripping onto my newly installed
carpet. Oil! I cup my hand to catch it and end up with a handful of hot oil
and no place to put it. This while we're still moving and in the space of
about 10 seconds. I scream, "Throw out your drink and give me your cup" to
Melody while turning in to the driveway of a fast food joint. She does and
holds the cup under the oil, catching it while I drive thru and back to the
house. I never stopped and was now driving, still with a handful of lukewarm
oil, trying to shift gears with my elbow without spilling anything. We coast
home and stop the engine with a 1/4 inch margin left in the cup before
overflow. Whew!
Dipstick shows 1 and 1/2 qts. low. Could've been worse. Lots worse.
I found that the plastic feedline had a split in it about 1/16 inch behind the
brass nut on the back of the gauge that allowed the oil to seep, no, gush out.
When I installed the gauge, I had left enough line to re-route it when the time
was right. ; ) I guess that left room for flex which fatigued the plastic to
the point of failure. Cutting 1/2 inch off and re-fitting the ferrule fixed
the leak. This episode forced the right time to come so I routed the line
properly and fastened it securely so it shouldn't happen again. When will I
ever learn to do it right the first time? A word to the wise, of which I am
not a member.
BTW, we still took that drive.
Dee "greasy palms" Jackson
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C.D. Jackson
Packaging Engineer '78 Spit FM90204U0
voice:910-547-5007
dee_jackson@gilbarco.com
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