Tartilla

Eric released a great vid on oil levels on the 540 dyno mule he's been flogging lately.

He stumbled on to some serious power loss with oil entrainment. Decided to test it out with various oil pan volumes. Some great info.

It's very relevant to the marine performance crowd with the violent movement on the engines often at extreme angles.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GJzrzHTWooE

Wally

iTrader: (1)

i like his vids
would be interesting to have a camera mounted in there to see exactly whats going on at the different levels

Tartilla

Yeah, Eric has some really great content. He's forged his own path and nothing really matches his consistent data.

He doesn't get enough viewers. Nick's garage utube vids are like popcorn, but he gets viewers.

Wally

iTrader: (1)

The few ive seen of Nicks seemed to be ok...but what i have seen its mostly just a dyno session...not much to learn...i dunno guess maybe i havent given it enough watch time

Tartilla

That was what I meant on Nick's. More like a reality TV session.
​​​
Many guys on here run less oil in their pans already. I've been thinking of what mods to make to my pans to lower the level and minimize the sloshing.

ICDEDPPL

iTrader: (1)

Engine masters did an entire episode with oil levels years ago. Kept taking oil out, kept increasing power.
I struggled with low oil pressure for years (aeration) till I went external oil pump and full windage tray. Drove me nuts.
Now she stays pretty solid, externally adjustable pressure.
The other advantage is an external oil screen which came in real handy when an engine builder used my block as a garbage can ( intake gasket and silicone )

Tartilla

Dan, fair point on the full length windage tray. Even more important on the rear where the hull angle tends to pool.

That is a Peterson pump? Just a single stage?

I'm pretty busy on the belt drive setup already that I can barely reach a of them. But it is tempting.

ICDEDPPL

iTrader: (1)

Peterson single stage .. i had to make a custom mount to be able to mount it with my belt set up.. that was not an easy one to make .

Tartilla

Really nice setup.
​​​​​
Always appreciate your quality photos and that you take the time to document your projects.

I'll see if I have room to open up some windage past the block skirt and add pan volume to drop oil level.

But focus on oil scraping and slosh prevention into crank.

articfriends

iTrader: (1)

Ive watched this video and have had several people tag me in it, send it to me over last day or two. IDK exactly what pan he was running or whats different from "normal" that hes got going on, something far more extreme then "normal" BUT I have screwed around with oil levels on my dyno for various reasons and it takes significant oil to get crank to run directly in the oil on a BBC at higher rpms . To see that kinda hp difference the rating of his pan musta been waaay off and put the oil directly into the crankshaft throws, at top of dyno pull. I have a hard time grasping THAT so much as i have seen quite a few BBC engines on my dyno start to have oil pressure twitch on top from running pan dry with too much oil in top where a qt or 2 extra made it stop.
So for discussion picture you pull a new oil pan out of box, you do a test fill with water and you measure it as you fill it (I have done this numerous times). Pan has a "built in/bolted in" baffle like THIS pic. So say pans rated at 10 qts, you do your fill test. 10 qts gets you a 3/4"" below that baffle, stationary, not running. 11 qts gets you 1/4" from baffle, 12 qts gets you 1/4" into the baffle. SO at 2 qts past its "rating" we have oil slightly above the baffle and are getting close to where the crank throws can start to touch the oil in pan. The oil draining back from top, spraying off crank from bearings, running back from top end is going to be the same on the dyno regardless of pan level assuming oil temp and viscosity are same for every test since all engines hold some oil on top at full rpms, the pan level goes DOWN some when running. Since erics engine was some kinda performance deal that may have been more race then the stuff we build for our boats, lets assume he restricted the oil to the lifters and has less oil in heads at high rpms but still the same there will be some. For oil level to affect the hp in HIS test as bad as it did, his stationary oil level had to be well above the baffle/windage tray stationary, not saying it didnt happen, just saying its far outside the norm.
Ive ran oil levels from quart, quart and a half low on dyno to 2+ qts past pan rating, when I had so much oil that I started to see signs on pressure gauge that crank was starting to whip it up, we saw a 7 to 10 hp drop, maybe. I guess I could have kept adding at that point and seen power decay even more BUT ive never came remotely close to this hp difference in all the stuff Ive ever dynoed.
we were racing my friends gto out of town, we were both taking turns driving during practice. Out of blue on hard decel we saw oil pressure drop close to zero and come back. we were running a 5.13 gear and going thru traps around 7000 (aluminum rodded pontiac 400 with solid flat tappets). Checked oil level, was normal. He had a moroso drag pan and this decel thing was a new thing. I made the assumption the oil pickup had fell off and said lets put it on the trailer, He said fuk all that Ill blow this fukker up before I sit here and watch everyone run all day. So I added a extra quart of oil, still did it but not as bad, added another quart of oil, problem was gone. He added another half a quart of oil because he was starting to get nervous. Now we had like 9.5 quarts of oil in a 7 quart pan. We had started out running 11.75s mid day heat when we saw the problem initially, air kept getting slightly better (dda went from 1500/1600 feet to about 1200 feet thru afternoon). Guess what, with all that extra oil in the pan, the car still ran low 11.70s and by evening we were in the 11.68 to 11.70 et. So in THAT case the extra oil did NOTHING to his hp obviously. Now maybe his car was putting more oil in top of motor and it didnt matter as much BUT my point is it clearly did nothing drastic to his power. On tear down later we found the tab broke off the pickup and pickup laying in bottom of the pan, hence me always saying weld your pickup on even if it has a tab. So IDK, I can only say his oil level vs crank throws had to be putting the level directly into the throws of crank bad to see what he did on the dyno.