Jocklandjohn

Yes I think you're right.

Probably not related to your problems but worth noting anyway. Some years back I fitted all new springs from a large well-known UK retailer of LR bits. The parts were all correct, right part numbers, sizes etc. I drove the van with them and on the first corner it almost turned over. It was horrendous. I thought there was a problem with something else but a check revealed nothing so it had to be the springs. To be sure I took it to a local specialist rural 4x4 garage and the owner took a spin for two minutes and came back ashen faced and basically refused to let me back on the road. I got the vendor to replace the set, which they were happy to do, and tried again. Same. Long story short, we replaced them three times with new springs and the same problem occurred, so whatever was wrong I assume it affected the entire batch of springs. Eventually I ditched them completely, and bought the LR OE Parts and the van was solid and predictable for the next decade. I was so concerned I wrote to the vendor and they said "We've had no complaints from anyone, so it must be your vehicle that is causing the problem." My van was an empty 110 HT with nothing in it, nor any adaptations. So moral - even things that are new, and are supposedly appropriately installed can be causing serious problems.

Aye - there are several aftermarket seats by various 'big' names that can be fitted - if your wallet can stand the damage. I believe that some of the older Volvo seats can go in, as I've seen them mentioned a few times over the years. Like HERE. I'm sure that if your fingers work like mine a trawl through Google will unearth this or this and a shed load more. :-) For more room though, you can possibly fit a Mud seat thingy to raise/move back the runners. Someone else will be along shortly with more advice I'm sure, so sit tight and see what turns up....... Hope this helps.

Thank you quaggy. I may be an old fart but I appreciate the value of logic - a vastly underrated process. As an electrical novice I need to hold my own hand quite a lot and take a methodical approach. What I love about doing it like that is that it presents learning opportunities about all the various component bits in a way that makes sense. I've learned a fair bit about oil pumps, oil pressure, and capillary gauges in the last week!

Was that a turbo or a turbot? Makes a difference to how slippery it is.......

....and to add.....at least the snow didn't happen and the torrential rain held off too whilst I rolled around on the ground fitting the new sender....however I now realize that the smell of sh*t I was getting outside the house is NOT coming from the farmer's field behind us, but from a pile of manure he dropped on the way to the field, and which I drove through and which has plastered the underside of the steering guard on the LR and is now all over the front of my old jacket which is totally minging.........and has been put outside to calm down. Ahh the joys of driveway mechanics....... I should rename this thread 'Strange blood pressure behaviour'..........

Just ordered a new gauge. Of course, after buying the new (and unnecessary) sender this morning to see if it was at fault (and it's not), the 'kit' with a new gauge comes complete with.....a new sender. Ahhhh. Into the spares drawer.

Ok - just ran all separate leads, direct from battery + and - and from the sender, to gauge, and its showing off the right hand of the scale. I think I can conclude that the gauge may be defective.

Ok new oil sender (transducer) fitted just now, gauge needle pings over to right off scale - with engine off and cold. Removed earth from gauge, needle goes back to rest, attached earth direct from battery to gauge (thus bypassing shared earth which connects several gauges) and needle goes ping off to the right again, completely off the scale (again engine off and cold) So I can deduce that A) the original sender was ok. B) it's not a bad earth that's the problem So if I run two wires direct to the pressure gauge from the battery + and - terminals, and a third wire direct from the new sender unit to the gauge and I still get the needle going off the scale, am I right that that proves that the gauge is defective?

I didn't use sealant on the sliding joints and it seems to have been ok. I'd also give the connecting clamps several coats of some high-temp rust inhibitor painty stuff if you can be bothered.

WHAT! You have WINDOWS! Where can I get some?

Earth wire run direct to battery. Same symptoms. So next stop is sender replacement.

That's a good plan Mo. Will give it a try. (PS - with luck my fuel pump will be off and swapped before Christmas - will ping you about it when its done).

Ok I attached the new wire I've run from the sender to the gauge, removing the old wire. With a loose connection to the gauge it flicks hard across the scale to the rhs - exactly the same as with the old wire. Having checked the earths which seem ok judging by behaviour of the other gauges, both of which work fine, and several other items on that circuit, and thinking this through - I'm narrowing it down to the sender unit being knackered, as all the other stuff is ok and the high reading occurs with old and renewed wiring. I'll let you know tomorrow once I've swapped the sender units.............(I really really don't want to lie in an icy puddle with snow covering my feet taking the sump off to renew the relief valve.....)

Ok - just in from lying underneath in the wet and snow (yuk) - I attached a separate wire to run inside and attach to the gauge, but before I even attached it I unscrewed the Mud console to access the back of the gauges and as soon as I moved it, it had the needle pinging over to the right way past 100psi - and this with the engine off. So I guess it is a power or earth glitch. I have three gauges in a line all powered (and presumably earthed) on a common circuit - none of the other gauges (water temp and oil temp) have been acting odd. What does that suggest to any electrical experts who may be reading? I'm leaning towards the signal feed wire as the problem- given that the other two gauges are ok. Would that be a fair assumption?

I've not yet swapped the pressure sender unit, nor bypassed the wiring to check if there's a short in the wire, I will do that today hopefully, snow permitting (it's dumping higher up but only a few flakes down here currently). Assuming a new sender and a wire check does not solve the problem and the gauge is still reading seriously high can someone give me some learned opinions re what else might be the cause of the oil overpressure. Is a failed oil thermostat likely to cause this problem? If not a thermostat fail then I assume that only leaves the main culprit as a stuck pressure relief valve in the sump? (Is a gummed up oil cooler a likely culprit?) And as a curiosity - I've had a fuel pump leak problem, could back-pressure from an overpressured oil system/engine cause the pump to leak as its working harder to shove fuel in, blowing back past the o-ring? I've got a slight oil weep from the rocker cover gasket which has been getting worse but which I thought was a failed o-ring on the separator or a pooped rocker cover gasket - the leak is coming from the area at the back of the separator. But maybe the overpressure is puffing the oil out the rocker cover? Now I'm wondering if rather than a gauge problem there is a real overpressure - which is causing all the various symptoms - and the gauge is in fact accurate with its display of initial high pressure from cold then back to 20-25psi at idle once warm but going very high when the throttle is blipped. I often warm the block with the Eberspacher in the winter before driving, so that would possibly have masked the major swing of the gauge needle that I noticed recently with a cold start-up, by heating the oil up so its warmer = less pressure - which is why I may not have noticed it until recently. Any thoughts?

No it will be stainless to stainless. The errant welder used mild steel wire to weld the stainless flare he'd cut off back onto the stainless pipe it used to live happily on. If I'm doing anything it will be stainless to stainless, with stainless wire.

Thanks Idris - so my symptoms are not an oil pump fail so at least I don't have to faff about with that then! Cheers.

Just to satisfy my ignorance - are my overpressure symptoms likely with a failed oil pump? What are the common symptoms of a failed oil pump?

I bought one from Rimmers for my 110 in 1998 and fitted it myself - it went on fine. Ran it for 8 years, up to 2006 and of course the connecting brackets at the section joins (being cast not stainless) failed eventually. I contacted RImmers and invoked the lifetime warranty which elicited a wee bit of confusion. I was told I'd need to provide the original receipt. They seemed surprised when I said it's xxxxxxxxx - "Oh ok, right, we changed our invoicing system a few years ago and we no longer use that numbering system and we don't have a record of your purchase I'm afraid..........but........the fact that you have that number means you did buy it from us because that numbering was unique to us. So ok certainly we can fix it for you but you'll need to pay for carriage both ways I'm afraid as that's not part of the warranty." So that's pretty good I thought. It was a bit of a laugh with the chap because he was surprised I"d kept the invoice (lesson there lads!). However now the spolier - it was so expensive to send the exhaust from the Highlands down and back I ended up at the local welder and they stuck a few plates on the joints for less than the postage cost! I ran it for another 4 years to 2012 (several very salty winters though) and the replacement plates failed and this time the (new) welder chap thought it was a smart idea to simply cut the stainless pipe end flares off, slip on new connector plates, weld back on flares. Fine except he used mild steel weld! I pulled him up on it and he said the mild steel weld will last as long as the mild steel connecting plates so they'll both need replacing at the same time. Hmmph! Anyway the mild steel weld failed so I replaced with a full mild steel exhaust system and put the stainless bits in the shed and as I now have a welder that does stainless I will cut off the mild carp and reweld with stainless myself and fit stainless connecting plates before I do ( found some on ebay). Bottom line - fit was good, price was good and invoking the lifetime warranty a decade later got a positive response. Hope this helps.

Yes that's a good idea.

Thanks Tanuki - its an electrical one. The thought of a ruptured capillary one skooshing hot oil into the dashboard wasn't appealing! I guess I could run a wire from dash gauge to sender and bypass the existing wire if the new sender acts the same. Is a pressure relief valve going to do this if its defective irrespective of whether there's a gauge? (translated: I have no idea what the pressure relief valve actually does nor where it is!).

I've got a pressure gauge on my oil line at the filter with an 1/8" NPTF sender onto a Durite meter. Yesterday the pressure whacked right over to the right hard against the far side of the gauge - so over 100psi. Easing off the throttle brought it back down again, blipping the throttle had it going back up and down wildly but so hard it was bouncing off the right hand side. The engine sounded and runs normal. I started it this morning and immediately the needle shot across to the right hard against the stop. Switched off the engine and it flew back but stopped about 20psi and gradually traveled the remaining distance to the left. Restarting several times produces the same behaviour, right over, back to 20, needle slowly easing down. My first thought is the sender unit under the engine may be knackered. Its currently being bathed in diesel as my fuel pump is leaking all over it (change over with refurb fuel pump imminent) but I wonder whether the diesel bath is responsible for the oil pressure sensor behaviour and is addling its brain......or ....there is something seriously wrong that is causing the over-pressure state. What could cause such an over-pressure situation that happens so dramatically? I have a new sender unit on order, be here Monday so I can check then. But if it is not that where should I be looking? Oil pump? Somewhere else?

Aye, will do. It'll be sooner rather than later all going to plan Mo.

Good man, thanks. Really appreciate it. Cheque went in the post 1stC. (once I found a PO that was actually open!)