Recently purchased truck. Aftermarket oil pressure gauge reads 100+ PSI. I confirmed with a second gauge. I removed the front cover and inspected oil pump which appears to be a new Melling M122. Pressure relief valve wasn't stuck and no shims had been installed on the spring. Balance Shaft Elimination Kit (BSEK) has been installed by a previous owner. The oil gallery blocking plug (looks similar to a cam bearing without oil hole in it) for the shaft on the driver's front side of the engine is in place. I can see what appears to be similar plugs where the rear journals of both balance shafts would have been. Engine seems to be in good working condition so I'm assuming pressure isn't being caused by a blockage in any of the oil galleries.



Questions

1. Should pressures be this high after BSEK is installed?

2. Are the plugs in the rear of where the shafts resided supposed to be there? The BSEK kits I've seen online and in videos only show one plug, the one in the front left, as part of the kit

3. Any thoughts on how to reduce pressure? e.g. lower spring rate for the oil pump relief, oil pump modifications etc?

4. Anything I haven't checked or covered?


Thanks in advance

JC

 

Welcome to the forum

 

1. Psi is not normal unless a high pressure oil pump was used
2.Balance shaft delete all have different guides by the manufacturer of them it help to know which kit was used.
3. change the oil pump
4. hard to answer that one to many variables


Was it worth the extra vibration all the time and worse in summer when using the AC on an hot day and the power gain of maybe up to only 5-7 hp? I know the throtle response was improved but shaving about 4/10s off Your 1/4 times and all the negative effects from my experience doing them at some point I stopped doing the Balance Shaft delete.

 

Did you confirm the high pressures with a simple screw-in mechanical gauge? Or was that with a second electric gauge?

 

Did you confirm the high pressures with a simple screw-in mechanical gauge? Or was that with a second electric gauge?

 

From memory your correct the front bearing s replaced with one with no oil hole. The rear (memory) is fed thru the balance shaft to the rear so nothing is done there. My only thought is the spring in the oil pressure relief valve is too strong. I'd check with another gauge first. The rest of your work seems fine.
The last one I did drove abt 50kms then it all went back to std by reinstalling the balance shaft. The vibrations were unbearable.

 

Thanks for the replies and sorry for the delayed response.

I'm testing using a dedicated oil pressure tester I bought from Harbor Freight. It reads the same as the aftermarket one installed in the dash and the spare I had laying around. So that's 3 gauges all reading the same. (80 idle to 120+ @3k RPM)

As mentioned above, you're correct, the rear bearings for the balance shafts DO NOT have holes and appear to have been fed from the front bearing via the shafts internally. Again, I didn't remove the shafts so I can't speak to any before/after comparisons between having them or not.

I ended up boring the relief holes a few 64ths (Don't recall which bit I used), reinstalled everything, ran it and the pressures were the same as before. I tore everything apart again, removed the oil pumps relief spring, clipped about 1.5 coils off of it, put everything together and now have around 50psi @idle and 70-80 around 3k RPM. Assuming the readings at the gauge are relative to the internal pressures at the filter, galleries, bearings etc, these readings give me the peace of mind I'm not going to blow a filter up and the engine is being adequately lubricated. Time will tell.

Thanks again to everyone for their replies and assistance.
JC