having a spot of bother with my oil pressure sender thread. Its a 1/4"npt thread into the back of an ally oil pump housing on the xe. first of all it leaked a lot and we managed to sort it with some ptfe tape but i'm not convinced its doing a very good job as i still get a little puddle of oil under the car from running the engine up.

Is there some threadlock type stuff that will seal it up and that is ok with oil? Its very difficult to get to the thread to clean it up sufficiently really.

Ned.

At work we install oil pipework and we use locktite 572 dont know how it performs on alloy. But seems to do the trick on most things

Mike

Ned, my escort does this when hot - we can't seem to stop it either. Are you referring to the section on the oil filter housing that is connected to an oil cooler when installed in the Astra/Cavalier? My next attempts will probably involve taking out the bungs and refitting new oil lines and an oil cooler.

has it bottomed out i.e. you cannot do it up any tighter?

or if there is a step on the nut, maybe a copper washer or o-ring?

I had small oil leak on my v8 - turned out the brass fitting for the oil pressure sender & adapeter were not tight enough - did up both the adpapter and sender end and sorted.

something else to try is to use some eletrical solder - softer than plumbers - and put that onto the thread? just one turn's worth on the adapter.

or araldite?

its a tapered thread so no flat for any sort of washer. its the rear facing thread on the back of the oil filter housing megatron, poinmts towards the starter. i've got a remote sender on the end of a braided line isolated on the chassis. I'll see if i can find a pic..

Ned.

bottom right of engine on this pic:
http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/upload/IMG_1707b.jpg
access is a bit tricky, bottom rightish of photo behind the silicone hose t-piece:
http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/upload/IMG_1975b.jpg

[Edited on 12/6/06 by ned]

Ah, gotcha... I think on my XE the sender threads do stick out a way and we did put a fair amount of ptfe tape on too!

The Loctite pipe seal that doesn't harden is the best a man can get.

Cheers,
Syd.

Loctite Threadseal 577 is the best stuff to use. Threadlocker is more for your average nut & bolt problem.



[Edited on 12-6-06 by RazMan]

Ned, p'raps I'm missing the point, but IIRC the thread at the back of the oil pump is 14mm...

tis indeed Stu, very similar in terms of size to 1/4 npt, but it most certainly aint!

well i had a 14mm->1/8npt adapter but it didn't fit the hole and the 1/4npt one did ?!

Ned.

guess i'll dig it out and try it again but i could never get the thread started as figured it was the wrong thread when i found the 1/4 was nearly the same size and fitted.

[Edited on 13/6/06 by ned]