How Can I Keep Up My 308's Oil Psi In A Hard Corner

84 308:

During track events I have noticed that my oil psi will swing to zero in a hard corner. I am not talking about a quick turn, I mean a long hard full throttle corner. When I turn in, the needle swings to the left but I am afraid of what I am doing when I floor it after the apex and keep it on the floor all the way thru the turn while the needle is still buried on zero. The little orange light never comes on.

It seems to happen more in a right-hander and I also hear a "rattling" sound from the engine until I am out of the turn. The sound is similar to what I would expect to hear if the grill mesh on the engine cover were loose (it's not). Once I am on the straight the psi is back up and the noise is gone.

This NEVER happens on the street, even under very quick driving.

I understand that the oil psi will rise and fall when I throw my car left and right. I am just concerned about the hard throttle thing while it's doing it.

Should I worry about this or not, and if so, is there a remedy?

 

Add a liter or pint of oil. It works for me and yes, worry about it. No oil pressure under load through a corner will damage the crank. The other options are modify the sump, go to drysump or slow down.

 

Tommy, add a 1 qt moroso accumulator like i did to mine--it holds 1 qt of oil under pressure on reserve

 

Dr. T, check the archives at the old site, but I recall that the fix for those guys that track a lot was to install the 328 sump pan and oil pick-up tube.

I was looking at Kermit's site the other day, and he had some new modified windage tray design. Not sure how difficult any of these mods are to install, so best to call him.
http://www.durable1.com/windage_trays.htm

Oh, and as Newman said, over filling by one quart is a common remedy as well.

 

Bill pound addressed this in depth in the old tech archive. He developed a drysump system for the 308 for about 2500. He also indicated that an extra quart or a sump extension wouldn't get it done.
Cruising through other posts, I came across Kermit's windage tray solution. he is at http://www.durable1.com.
I have not persued this further as I have only just acquired the car and have a lot of work to do before i can track the car. but I am verry interested in the effdectiveness of kermit's solution.
let me know what you find out,

regards,
chris

ps that rattling noise you hear from the engine is the sound of metal parts hitting each other without the benefit of lubrication or it could be the sound of hundred dollar bills getting ready to flee your wallet in great numbers -

 

dave, you were faster than I was.
chris.

 

Charles - can you give me the details on your set-up?

 

Tommy

I've been down this path too and really there's no good answer short of a lot of money.

First it is more problematic on FI cars than the carb'd cars (where you get both oil and fuel starvation). Happens worst on long RH corners, like the carousel at Road America but I've had it on turn 14 as well.

As Chris noted, when I chatted to Bill Pound he thought the only solution was dry sump but you have to loose the AC (its where he put the DS tank).

QV London boys said 328 sump (deeper) was an improvement.

Others have tried Accusumps but Pound's view was they were unlikely to be helpful given the flow rate of the Ferrari pumps (he thought an Accusump would drain in 2 or 3 seconds and a long RH, like the carousel is probably ten to fifteen seconds).

Phil Hughes (I think) of "downunder fame" suggested overfilling the sump by about an inch on the dipstick. Route the oil separator to a catch can (just in case).

I've done the latter. It (the gauge) swings around a bit but no untoward noises. Worse now on race rubber and better suspension stuff.

If someone made a reasonably priced DS solution I'd look at it. Kermit? Anyone?

****ty answer, but thats the sum of it. So, just overfill the sump and drive the (insert word of choice) out of it.

Philip

 

Actually, the serious track teams did bit more than just use the stock 328 parts (altho they do help a lot).

A ~1" extender was also added between the 328 sump cover & the bottom of the sump. The oil pickup tube was similarly extended. This gave the sump about an add'l 2 quarts capacity as well as the improved pickup tube scavenging the well in the 328 sump cover provides.

I've got one of those setups and have been considering reproducing it, probably the sump bottom & the extension would be a 1-piece Al casting, and you would send your orig. pickup tube to be extended.

Anyone seriously interested?

If so, what would you consider a reasonable price?

 

Verrell has the right idea. BP was correct the only forsure deal is the DS. But even he in the early years say about 1980 used 1" Al castings to extend the sump and different windage trays with an extended pick-up. The hard part is the AL casting but you could do that at home. It is pretty lowteck. Try Linsay Books.com and they have a book on your own AL foundry. Then you cut and weld the pick-up it is maild steel tube again low tech. The windage tray is realy not as important as the extra oil but would need to be welded up with longer atachment arms to the new location in the deeper sump again lowtech. Forget accusumps because they will dump in 2 seconds

 

Am I correct to assume that the dry-sump Euro 308s from 1976 don't have this problem? Why did Ferrari go away from using this system? It's standard issue on Porsche 911s - I would think that it would be on these cars too. A dry sump is almost a requirement for any heavy track driving, in my opinion...

-Wayne

 

Cost.....they realized the most owner do not run their cars at the track and would never miss it, especially on 1970/1980 tires.

This is one of the main reasons I do not do track events, autocross only (there are no 15 second turns). Low oil pressure will ruin the engine in very short order...if you're hearing noises it may already be too late, or it might just be the valve train (getting ruined). Normally, a dropping oil pressure gage means shut the engine down immediately until you sort it out.

A deeper sump would definitely help, but is extremely vulnerable to damage, particularly if you have lowered the car at all. I think I would want an extension welded on the bottom of the frame, like a skid plate.

I really think a dry sump conversion is the only good answer and $2500 sounds about right for it. A good pump is about $800 last time I looked, then the hose and tank and mounting. I think a simple tank could be put on the rear fire wall, or in the front truck. It might be possible to make a custom tank that goes in front of one of the rear wheel, tight though.

 

Tommy,
look for accusump on the net and read how it works--but dont buy from them--too much $$

go to Summitt Racing .com and get the smaller (1 qt) version for about 50.00
Actually I have seen old hotrodders use fire extinguisher bottles also.

you will have to get about 3 feet of -8 aeroquip hose, 2 -8x1/2npt fittings, and 2 -8 hose ends.

I will have to look at the stock oil lines to see how to get it plumbed in. If you recall I went to remote oil filters when I added mine. I may have to machine you some kind of addapter--call me and we can discuss it.

 

I had the exact same problem with my old GT4 track car A 3-qt. Accusump helped, but did not eliminate, the problem. As the consensus above indicates, this could lead to very expensive engine failure. I suspect that a dry sump is the definitive solution.

 

I REALLY appreciate everyone's input. I have a few ideas now. When I get it all together and try it I will post the results. Charles - I'll call you this afternoon. Thanks a million

 

Verell
I think Mark highlights an important issue with the deeper pan. I've wacked my pan on the rumble strips at Blackhawk before and, now it is lowered a little, anykind of sump protrusion is going to be vulnerable. It is why I've held off doing this.

I am no fluid engineer, but could a two-pronged oil pick up work in some way (or would one sucking air defeat the other trying to suck oil?).

I think the reason for moving away from DS was primarily packaging. The US cars needed the emissions pumps which if you'll recall is where the DS tank is placed.

If a decent DS set up could be put together for $1500, I'd be seriously interested.

 

I would NOT push the car thru the corners if it loses oil pressure if I were you. As the sending unit uses an small metered hole to slow the response (the gauge needle would flutter all over without it), it also makes it slow to respond. This means that by the time the gauge starts to drop, you allready have been running without any oil pressure. Aside from the obvious bottom end bearings, the Cam bearings take a real beating there, as they are "the last in line " to get oil. often scrubbing the cam journals.
A to the Effectiveness of our windage tray modification, perhaps Dave can ask our friend Stewart if he has ever had any oiling probs on cornering, as he is running one in his '79 308. The positive side of them is cost(comparitive), and there is no loss in ground clearance. The down side is the tray must be taken out to modify, which means motor removal.
HTH
Kermit

 

The drysump engines have a couple of pickups in the pan. Another alternative could be a swinging pickup. Ive seen this before on domestic cars and they follow the oil. Its probably complicated to fabricate just thought I would mention it.

 

So could the DS pick up be used on a WS car? Anyone know?

 

Dry sump systems use 2, 3, or 4 stage pumps, so effectively each pickup goes to it's own pump. If one pick up is just pulling air, the others pick up the oil and return it to the tank. The high pressure pump that feeds the engine then draws out of the tank and always has oil. The tank is also usually 3 or 4 times taller than it is in diameter, so no amount of cornering force will uncover the pickup to the pressure pump.

Just putting more tha one pickup on one pump will make the problem worse because as soon as 1 pickup is in air, air is all you will be pumping. In theory, you could mount the pickup to move with the oil, but friction tends to be a problem, maybe use a rubber hose, but it will require frequent (annual) replacement.

 

Really? I'm surprised. Anyone done this?

 

I have a serious amount of track time under my belt in 3x8 cars. Of course, a dry-sump system is ideal, but retrofitting a wet sump 308 can be expensive and elaborate process. It's more than likely an engine-out modification and will add plumbing, belts, additional failure points, etc. Don't get me wrong, I like dry sumps, and even converted my 81 308 to dry sump... but I wouldn't do it again.

IMHO, the accusump systems are not adequate for long sweeping turns, and their supply pressure starts good and gets poor really fast.

The best and most cost effective modification for a 308 or 308 QV is to upgrade to the 328-style sump and pickup tube. It's two parts (plus a gasket) that cost about $600-$800 that can be installed by a relative novice in a short period of time (2-4 hrs). With the oil topped up, we never manged to suck air in a 328 shod with Hoosiers at a very tight course during a two day track event. The cars do tend to use some oil at high revs, so it's important to check the oil level several times during an event.

 

I like the 328 pan upgrade idea. How does it differ from the 308 style. The 308 has what looks to be a pretty good system of baffles and doors that you think would work well but it falls short. Is it deeper than the 308 pan? Any pics?

 

The details are on service bulletin 10-16 - available on Steve Jenkins Site pages 91-93 -

http://ferrari.stevejenkins.com/books/328_tech.pdf

I have put the relevant bits in a Word doc. as an attachment - hope it works!

John

 

Thanks for the info!