yes, oil was changed just before I bought the truck, but it wasn't a Fram filter if that's what you're asking! I think it was called "professional's choice" or something like that - not something you can buy in a parts store, it was done by a corner gas station. I just changed the oil yesterday with a Purolator filter and Rotella 30W oil but haven't driven it long enough to say whether that has "fixed" the problem or not.

By the way, I put a gallon of oil in the engine, then drove to a flat spot to fill exactly to the "full" mark on the dipstick. It ended up taking exactly six quarts, but when I rechecked in my (mildly sloped) driveway, it showed as very low. So maybe that whole thing was a red herring and I just have to check the oil only on a perfectly flat pad i.e. gas station or similar because the dipstick does not appear to work well on anything other than a flat surface.

The Stude is actually a '55 coupe, but with an Avanti engine and 4-speed transplanted into it... I had pics on my web site but have not put them back up since I changed ISPs.

nate

 

follow up... drove the truck again tonight. I'm still having issues! I swapped in a cluster with a tach, not sure if this is relevant or not (I'd agreed to order it before the noise that started this whole thread was noticed, otherwise I wouldn't have spent the $. But since I had it I figured I might as well put it in, I can always swap it back out if I sell the truck.) anyway I was driving around and found that sometimes when accelerating away from a stop, the oil pressure would rise off idle like normal and then drop back down again as I was accelerating. Other times it would behave perfectly normally. When the oil pressure dropped, a couple times I thought I heard the rod rattle that had freaked me out previously. I wasn't seeing this the last time I drove the truck, it seemed perfectly OK then. The only thing I've done since then, besides swap out the cluster, was to change the oil and filter. Now remember that when I was driving it before changing the filter but after the mechanic looked at it and said that it was fine, it was probably a quart and a half over full. I know now that it is exactly on the money with respect to oil level because when I changed the oil I put in exactly four quarts, drove to a level pad, checked the oil, and added exactly two more. This brings the oil level just to the top of the hatched area on the dipstick and my owner's manual also says that I should put in five quarts plus one more for the filter. Here's my latest theory... I actually have a cracked pickup tube, or other fault in the pickup, and the combination of slightly elevated RPM and the act of accelerating is uncovering whatever fault there is and allowing the oil pump to suck air, thus causing the death rattle. However, when the engine is overfilled with oil, the extra oil in the pan keeps the engine from sucking air and all is happy.

You guys buying that? Is it time to take it back to the mechanic and ask him to drop the pan? In the meantime, how many quarts can I safely overfill without running into foaming issues? I'll try swapping the old cluster back in tomorrow and drive it again, but I suspect that the issue is not with the cluster at all, but best to rule out all variables. If that fails I guess I will try overfilling by a quart and see what happens then.

sheesh, this truck would drive me to drink, if I could stop messing with it long enough to make a beer run. I had the beginnings of a "how to" on the tach swap/real oil pressure gauge procedure in my camera too, but I'm too bummed out about this issue to do a good job of putting it online. Not because it was hard, but because it was so easy that I figure if I put it online other people will realize how easy it is and do it to their own trucks

Oh, and I busted the little posts that the fuel tank switch mounts to on the back of the dash facia when pulling it off - dunno how that could have happened, unless they were just already weak and ready to go. But at this point that is a minor issue, that probably won't go back on for months at this point.

nate

 

Update: put a mechanical gauge on this AM, went for a drive, saw the electric dash gauge drop when I got hard on the gas but the mechanical gauge stayed steady at about 55 PSI. Dunno what the noise is but apparently it's not a rod bearing, and I didn't hear it anyway this AM, because the oil pressure is fine - just the gauge freaking me out. Guess I should check all the engine grounds, can't think what else it could be other than maybe a tenuous wire connection to the sender.

I dropped the truck back off at the corner mechanic because I want a new oil pan gasket (it's tearing up my driveway,) and he said he would check the screen and pickup while he was in there. I think that should be the end of that, now to just get back to the program of catching up on maintenance...

nate