# low oil pressure



## horney2thebone (Jun 18, 2008)

my 1.8 oil pressure is 95 lbs when coldbut when the oil temp gets to 190 degrees it will drop to 10 or 15 at idle. am running elf full synthetic oil. is there any way to raise the pressure of these motors. pulled pan all is nice and clean .pump looks good. rod and mainbearings look good no extraordinary ware. help please


----------



## shipo (Jan 3, 2006)

*Re: low oil pressure (horney2thebone)*

What makes you think the idle pressure is too low?


----------



## horney2thebone (Jun 18, 2008)

*Re: low oil pressure (shipo)*

because in the vw servive manual it atates lowest acceptible oil pressure on the 1.8 is 29 lbs at idle


----------



## stratclub (Feb 3, 2007)

*Re: low oil pressure (horney2thebone)*

Are you sure your not looking at the spec for the minimum pressure at 2000 RPMs? Pressure seems kinda high for idle. Course I don't have a 1.8T manual to check.
How acurate is the gauge? Is it the stock gauge or after market gauge? Did you plumb a gauge of known acuracy into the oil system? If the spec is correct, and you don't hear tappet noises at idle, could just be an indicating problem.
Oil pressure is controlled mostly by main and cam bearing clearances in the engine, clearances in the oil pump and the viscosity (thickness) of the oil.
An engine with a lot of miles will have lower oil pressure than a new engine because of internal wear. The usual fix is to rebuild the engine. When engines get older people generally go to a heavyer weight oil.











_Modified by stratclub at 2:03 PM 9-24-2008_


----------



## shipo (Jan 3, 2006)

*Re: low oil pressure (horney2thebone)*


_Quote, originally posted by *horney2thebone* »_because in the vw servive manual it atates lowest acceptible oil pressure on the 1.8 is 29 lbs at idle 

Twenty-nine PSI at idle? Yikes! I've been wrenching for a long-long time, and I've never-ever-never heard of an engine that was supposed to have oil pressure that high at idle. In fact, the ten to fifteen PSI that you spoke of in your first post sounds a tad high for a well used engine with lots of miles on it.
FWIW, while I've never spent any time working on the 1.8T, I was helping an associate diagnose a failing oil pump on a VW 2.0 engine a while back, and IIRC, the oil pressure idiot light wouldn't illuminate until the pressure got down to something like three PSI.


----------



## horney2thebone (Jun 18, 2008)

*Re: low oil pressure (shipo)*

i wil double check . all my air cooled always were low , first water vw. thanks guys i will be at the shop tomorrow and reread http://****************.com/smile/emthup.gif


----------



## horney2thebone (Jun 18, 2008)

*Re: low oil pressure (horney2thebone)*

well manual says 29 at idle and 44-62 at 2000 rpm . thanks


----------

