This post is for anyone having issues with oil pressure suddenly dropping to 0 after warm up. I have fixed 3 rams so far with this same problem. All had 318’s in them so I’m not sure if this will work on the 360’s. After your motor warms up the viscosity of your oil becomes lighter. Therefore flows faster and makes it easier to pull gunk and debris off parts in the motor. This debris falls to the bottom of your oil pan after you shut the motor off. If you don’t know there is a screen that sits near the bottom of the pan that keeps that stuff out of your pump. The screen is surrounded by a mushroom like disk with a small ¾ inch hole in the middle. The gunk in your motor gets sucked through this hole and clogs the screen. The bad part is after you turn your motor off the gunk falls to the bottom of the disk a ¼ inch away from the screen. After a while this stuff can build up and block oil from getting to the pump causing the instant drop in pressure to 0.
So to fix this you need to drain the oil and take the pan off. If you look at the screen with a flashlight it might not look too bad. I took a wiz wheel and cut the bottom of the disk like a pie and peeled back the metal. There will be crud built up around the outer part of the inside of the disk. Spray brake cleaner into the screen until it’s spotless. I also took a wire brush across the inside of the pan and wiped it clean. The gunk I have found looks like burnt paint and the bottom of the pan didn’t have paint on it… Put the pan back on with some Mr. Gasket and this should solve your problem. This fix can take a little time since there are some brackets and a starter in the way.

 

welcome to DF.

good tip. but beware that sometimes the sending unit can malfunction and send a zero signal. mine recently did that. i opted to blindly change the sending unit first because it was easier and cheaper than dropping the pan and buying a new oil pan gasket.

Brookville - i've fished at the lake there. beautiful lake.