Dear Bill,
The adaptor plate has one passage that leads out of the block oil pump
discharge hole and straight into the oil filter adaptor so that the oil goes
past the oil pressure relief valve and then through the filter. After that
the oil comes out of the adaptor block into the oil line that goes to the
cooler, throught the cooler back into the adaptor block and straight into
the main oil galley. The hole leading into the galley is the uppermost hole
in the block. If the accusump is plumbed into that line, it should be a
straight shot into the main galley. Try tapping an oil pressure gauge into
the oil line that brings oil from the main galley up to the rocker gear on
that engine and see what your pressure is at that point. The original
factory point for reading the oil pressure is very bad. It is immediately
after the oil pump, but before the pressure relief valve, filter, cooler,
etc. any problems in the oil system downstream could completely block the
flow of oil into the engine and the gauge might still read 90 psi if the
pump were pumping and there were oil in the sump. It is really imperative to
read the oil pressure as close to the bearings as possible. That is usually
the main galley the feed oil to the mains.
I believe that Kas had a testing rig at one time where he could read the
oil pressure inside the crankshaft of a running Spitfire 1500 engine. This
was done to diagnose and cure problems with rod bearing failures racing with
that engine.
Can you tell us more about this Kas?
Regards,
Greg Solow
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bill Babcock" <BillB@bnj.com>
To: "'Rocky Entriken'" <rocky@tri.net>; "Jack W. Drews"
<vinttr4@geneseo.net>; <fot@autox.team.net>
Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2003 11:19 AM
Subject: Accusump Blues
> I'm going gently nuts here. I replumbed my accusump after ripping it out
> at the Monterey Historics when my oil lines went bad. I got a much nicer
> oil cooler adapter plate from Gregg Solow and an oil cooler with AN
> fittings and a bunch of hose and fittings and did a nice clean refit in
> the pits (if I do say so myself) but the accusump was set aside for later.
>
>
> So this week after deciding that I didn't have any oil gallery plugs or
> other alternatives that were suitable for direct connection, I replumbed
> the accusump into the oil cooler line. I included the check valve as
> usual.
>
> I can charge the accusump when I open the valve, the gauge rises to about
> 50#, but when I shut off the engine and open the accusump valve I don't
> get any pressure on the car's oil pressure gauge and my oil light doesn't
> go out. The accusump slowly (very slowly) drains down to 20#.
>
> As far as I can see this is fairly hard to screw up. I've got flow through
> the oil cooler and back to the adapter plate, so I don't have the check
> valve in wrong. I get oil to the accusump. I've plumbed the accusump on
> the return line from the cooler, but I don't see how this could matter.
> The accusump is on the return side of the check valve (after the cooler),
> as it was before.
>
> The only thing I can think of is moving the accusump to the other side of
> the check valve, but that would let it drain back through the oil pump and
> the check valve wouldn't do anything--the accusump pressure would open it.
>
>
> I'm flummoxed. Greg, is there something different about that adapter
> plate?
>
> I'm still using the stock banjo connector for the oil pressure. I should
> probably connect it directly to the oil gallery instead, but until I'm
> sure that my plumbing is O.K. that would make me nervous--changing too
> many things at once.
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