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Car is a 2003 9-5 2.3LPT with 82K on the odometer.
The history of thinking I have a problem.
Car had a leaking oil pressure sender and I changed it with a new sender from Saab. One day my wife called me with a low oil pressure warning going off. I had her check the oil and crank the car back. The oil was fine, no warning at idle and no noise in the engine. I went home that night and changed the oil sender unit again and I have not had a warning since. I also inspected the wiring for chafing or any grounding problem that could have set it off.(again thank you Saab for giving me an idiot light and not a gauge) I have been in the valve cover of this engine and it is clean as a new engine. No Sludge. I do use Mobil 1 0-40.
I decided to preventive maintenance replace the oil pump rotor gears (0ld ones looked fine with no scratches) and the outer cover and seals as well as the spring and oil relief piston (old one fell right out with no scoring) in the middle of a 4000 mile oil run that I did an oil analysis on. The Blackstone report came back with a 19 and the normal for my run should have been an 8 or less. Could the new pump gears and cover cause this test to run high for lead when lead usually means bearing wear?
I now have taking the time and pain of installing a 1.5 inch mechanical oil pressure gauge under the hood in tandem with the oil light (used a 6psi generic 1/8 npt sender to accomplish this Saab using 5-7psi to set off their sender) After a hard run I have 18-20psi at idle and at 2000rpms I have 30psi where my Haynes manual shows minimum at 2000rpms should be 35psi. This assumes China can make an accurate mechanical oil pressure gauge/???
During the last oil change I was out side the car for the dry startup of the new filter and oil. Absolutely no knocking or noise upon the initial pressure up of the system to indicate worn bearings.
My question for the board’s knowledge is: Am I an automotive hypochondriac or do I have a problem? Any help is greatly appreciated.
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