damaged sump? Losing oil pressure at idle & low RPM

[qstoria]

Hey there

I'm after some help and advice regarding what i think is damage i have sustained after my oil sump took a decent knock.

when driving recently i was exiting from a highway to a petrol station and drove over an uneven piece of road at the entrance to the station where I felt a heavy knock at the front of the car. I knew the sump or the frame at the front ahd been hit, was hoping it was the frame but suspect it was the sump.. So I pulled up, got my petrol and turned the car back on to head off again when i immediately heard a mechanical grinding type noise coming from the front. At the same time i saw my oil lamp start flickering.

I drove the car around the back of the station where there was plenty of room to drive around a bit. What seems to be happening is that from idle up to about 1500 rpm the oil lamp will come on, above these revs it goes off and stays off. The car itself does not feel any different at all. The noise is not permanent, it only happens when the revs are increasing or decreasing between approx 800-1500 rpm.

After bout ten minutes or so of driving around trying to deduce the problem I decided that I should be fine to finish my trip home (150km) as most of the driving was on the highway and when I came to a stop in town I would keep the revs above 1500. I got home no problems however dont want to drive the car again until I have sorted it out.

Only thing i can think of is that the knock to the sump has damaged something inside it perhaps causing a lack of oil pressure in that rev range. or the knock has dislodged something else or damaged the oil pump perhaps?

It has been 4 days now and there is no oil leak at all. Is there an oil pickup or something that could physically have been damaged which could cause what I am experiencing? The car was running perfectly before hand so I am assuming that the knock is to blame for it otherwise it would have been a big co-incidence if something else has broken at the same time! The oil and filter were changed around 1500km ago.

Any suggestions etc are much appreciated

[e240]

Is there a dent on the Sump? Post a picture of the Sump...
Is there sufficient Oil in the Sump? Did you check the oil levels?

[qstoria]

Is there a dent on the Sump? Post a picture of the Sump...
Is there sufficient Oil in the Sump? Did you check the oil levels?

ok so no visual signs of a dent in the sump,

I had a look this morning to double check the oil level and did find that it was sitting quite low as it was under the first hole on the dipstick.. this is strange as i had changed oil and filter approx 1500km ago so I think the oil is definitely getting out in some shape or form.

I have no visual evidence of oil leaking from the motor (no oil patches under the car where it is parked etc). Recently the motor has been using more oil than normal though. for example i will change oil and filter every 5000km however in that 5000km im finding that i will go through 3-4L of oil in top ups.. I origianlly put this down to the mugen N1 ecu im running and also started to think that the Honda OEM oil was maybe not the best oil to use with that ecu and also the summer months are obviously much hotter. The engine is a k20a.

Anyway i have just gone and bought some standard oil and filled the motor back up. original problem of Oil lamp light on at idle and up to 1500 rpm is now gone however the car is running like a lawnmower! sounds and feels very lumpy. This morning before I topped it up i reversed the car about ten metres and it felt normal however now with the oil topped up it feels terrible. I only put in valvoline XLD premium 20-50w oil as it was $26 to see if that would fix the problem. If it did then I was gonna drain it straight away and keep for our other old car and refill mine with quality oil (nulon 15-50w 100% synthetic performance oil stuff)

There is a noise of some sort that does occur at lower revs still so im sure something has been damaged. I normally take my car to a mechanic i know however I cant at the moment so im probably gonna have to take this to Honda or a mechanic im not familiar with so im trying to get as much info as possible before doing so.

Throw me some ideas on what could be occurring

[e240]

If you have been running the car for sometime with a very low oil level, you could've damaged the engine by now - you did say that your oil pressure light has been flickering for quite a while - so that means the car hasn't been getting lubricated properly for quite a while.

Assuming what you say that there's no leak, how does a K20A burn through 4litres of oil every 5000km? Sounds like the engine wasn't very healthy to begin with. The weight of oil shouldn't have any impact to the way the engine runs as you have described.

Is there smoke coming out your exhaust when you drive? I'd get a compression test done on the car...

[qstoria]

If you have been running the car for sometime with a very low oil level, you could've damaged the engine by now - you did say that your oil pressure light has been flickering for quite a while - so that means the car hasn't been getting lubricated properly for quite a while.

the oil lamp began flickering the other day immediately after the sump made contact with the ground. Like I explained in the original post, the lamp would flicker on at idle and up to around 1500rpm then go off at revs above this. This enabled me to get my car home. So in reality the lamp has probably only been on and flickering a handful of times.

I decided to take a look at a few other things this afternoon so i took out my spark plugs and found that they are almost completely ruined so im going to replace them tomorrow and see what difference that makes. The car did feel as if it was not running on all cylinders.

As for slightly modified k20's using higher than normal amounts of oil, it doesnt seem to me to be that uncommon. I know of two other people running similar setups (K-Pro and Mugen N1 ecu's as well as aftermarket headers and aftermarket exhaust systems) who are experiencing very similar oil consumption levels. I did think that I was having an issue only to find that when i spoke to them i wasnt alone. Dont get me wrong, i still think that that amount of oil is not normal to use but the common factor seems to be the aftermarket ECU's. beforehand when using the stock PRC ecu, oil consumption was no where near as high..

[blk_shadow]

Firstly, I think 15W50 full synthetic is abit too out there for Honda engines (it's me tho)

Secondly, the easiest way now is to check your sump and your oil pick up. I'm suspecting its your oil pick up. Either that, or your sump got hit, and in return it hits the oil pick up and the oil pick up got pushed up and hits/damages something else (just a possibility)

Generally, aftermarket ECU's won't be designed to burn more oil if its driven normally, unless either the car's been driven hard often times or from the tuning itself.