odd oil pressure behaviour

[hoppo4.2]

all of a sudden one day a few weeks back. my oil pressure gauge started doing odd things.

when the car is cold all is good. 60 odd psi

once warm all is still good until you come to a stop then pressure drops instantly to 0. but no warning light.

few revs and its back up to 30psi.

now the really odd bit is that if you turn it off and on and go for a drive it will show pressure at idle the first few times you stop then back to 0.

i dont think its actually getting 0psi as it sounds fine and theres no warning light.

i guess it could be the pressure relief valve but wouldnt that bring the light on?

or it could be the sensor but its an odd way for it to fail.

[QBee]

Check the connection of the wire to the sender. It's right down at the bottom front of the engine.
Mine did this - I accelerated, good oil pressure, I braked, nil.
It was the loose terminal moving.

[Steve_D]

Those senders are prone to failure. When you go to check it you may well find the terminal is both loose in the sender body and leaking oil.

Steve

[Sir Paolo]

TVR gauges aren’t known for their accuracy.

In the end, I replaced both the sender and gauge, when I started getting erratic readings.

IIRC, the oil pressure relief valve is set to 45psi, so the gauge shouldn’t be reading much above this anyway.