Hello all, I have a 96 Dodge Ram, 5.2 thatI just purchased. I posted a couple of days ago about my oil sending unit. Since then I have read and my wife also on other problems showing similar symptoms with different causes. So here goes.
My Ram has 141,000 miles on it and runs pretty good for a 11 year old truck. When I first start out in the morning my oil pressure is up to almost 80lbs when I get to work which is 35 miles away it is down to around 40lbs at 70mph. When I come to the red light, which I never miss the gauge goes back and forth then to 0lbs and the oil light comes on. There is no change in engine sounds, temp, or RPM . When you just touch the gas pedal it jumps back up to 40lbs until I stop again. Oil was changed this weekend and I put a bottle of STP oil treatment in with it. I use 5-30wt. So do I have floaties/boogers/kooties in my oil or is there a serious issue starting here?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

i know this sounds stupid but first of all check the oil level. a couple of people recently posted on this and then came back and said it was low. anyway, that's a lot of fluctuation and it 80 psi doesn't seem accurate. mine with 130k and new oil pump and sending unit is a little over 40 at rpm and little under 40 at idle. at cold startup it might be up to 50. i did a Gunk engine flush last weekend and it had no effect on oil pressure. i'd recommend replacing your sending unit. its hard to reach.

 

I checkd the oil level first thing I thought of. I went out and bought the oil sender and the SpEcIaL socket . just gotta get time to replace it.
Thanks 4 ur help..let you know if it does the job.

 

Thanks I changed the oil unit out and the pressure at a cold start is almost 50 like you said. It goes to 40 for a while then once a few miles are on it drops to around 35. Thanks for the help.
G