172 Cup
Hoping there might be someone who can help out with the Formula Renault engine in my project car, which is basically an F4R but with a Renault Sport dry sump. I came to starting it up today and first cranked the engine without plugs etc to build oil pressure, but ended up spending the whole afternoon cranking and troubleshooting!
The dash read 0.2 Bar at first, but this didn't change at all whether stopped or cranking so I popped the filler cap blanking plug off and found little sign of oil around the cams. I probably cranked for 3 mins total in bursts of 10 sec but still got nothing.
Things I have checked:
Went to undo the oil filter and a fair bit of oil oozed out, so it seems to be making its way there OK.
Same story if I take the remote sender hose off the block - oil pisses out the hole.
I also took the hose off entirely and blew through it - no blockages - and oil will come out the end if I attach the hose to the block and remove the sender.
Took the return hose off the oil tank and aimed it into a pan - no oil coming through whatsoever.
Took the inlet hose off the pump to make sure I didn't do anything stupid like leave a glove in there - seems fine!
After I removed the sender it stopped saying 0.2 Bar on the dash and now just reads zero. I cranked for another 5 mins or so in 20 sec bursts and got absolutely nothing!
The sender is obviously a suspect but it definitely read 0.2-0.3 Bar the first few times I cranked, before removing it. I am suspicious that it didn't return to zero though, as the engine sat for some time without turning over while I checked things and scratched my head.
I'm out of ideas tbh, other than to keep cranking and hoping it eventually works. I've rebuilt a few engines and know sometimes it can take ages to get oil pressure, but this oil pump is gravity fed so I don't really see why it would be so difficult to prime!
Does anyone have any suggestions? Are there any things specific to the F4R that might make priming difficult, or any common things that get blocked internally? Has anyone got experience with dry sumped F4R or dry sumps in general?
The dash read 0.2 Bar at first, but this didn't change at all whether stopped or cranking so I popped the filler cap blanking plug off and found little sign of oil around the cams. I probably cranked for 3 mins total in bursts of 10 sec but still got nothing.
Things I have checked:
Went to undo the oil filter and a fair bit of oil oozed out, so it seems to be making its way there OK.
Same story if I take the remote sender hose off the block - oil pisses out the hole.
I also took the hose off entirely and blew through it - no blockages - and oil will come out the end if I attach the hose to the block and remove the sender.
Took the return hose off the oil tank and aimed it into a pan - no oil coming through whatsoever.
Took the inlet hose off the pump to make sure I didn't do anything stupid like leave a glove in there - seems fine!
After I removed the sender it stopped saying 0.2 Bar on the dash and now just reads zero. I cranked for another 5 mins or so in 20 sec bursts and got absolutely nothing!
The sender is obviously a suspect but it definitely read 0.2-0.3 Bar the first few times I cranked, before removing it. I am suspicious that it didn't return to zero though, as the engine sat for some time without turning over while I checked things and scratched my head.
I'm out of ideas tbh, other than to keep cranking and hoping it eventually works. I've rebuilt a few engines and know sometimes it can take ages to get oil pressure, but this oil pump is gravity fed so I don't really see why it would be so difficult to prime!
Does anyone have any suggestions? Are there any things specific to the F4R that might make priming difficult, or any common things that get blocked internally? Has anyone got experience with dry sumped F4R or dry sumps in general?
