Let’s talk oil system

[DCIV]

Currently our stock oiling system works as such (correct me if I’m wrong)

Gets picked up out of the pan, through the oil pump, directly into the oil filter housing. Now if the pressure is too high there is a bypass....does it dump it back into the pan? If not too much pressure if goes into the oil filter then if hot enough through the cooler and into the motor.

Is that correct?

Isn’t the oil filter housing a huge restriction? Lots of sharp turns? If you designed it how would it be?


Coop

[mjannusch]

If it gets bypassed at the filter, it is just that some of the oil is unfiltered, it still goes through the system.

[vr4]

If I were to design it I wouldn't. I'm not an engineer and try to let those with more letters in their degrees design critical systems.

[DCIV]

My point is you see people with the plates, instead of oil filter housing, that come out to aftermarket oil housing and somehow to an oil cooler. I was just curious if that is better and if it is how much.


Coop

[mjannusch]

It depends on what percieved problem you are trying to solve. Personally I don’t have any big issues with the oil system. If tracking a 3S then an upgraded oil cooler that’s not mounted behind an intercooler is probably worth it.

Biggest thing is to change the oil and filter on the maintenance schedule.

[DCIV]

I’ve never had any personal problems. I do have a huge oil cooler behind the intercooler though.

My issue is just efficiency. Seems like it takes some hard turns really close to the source. Also wouldn’t be a horrible thing to have options to different and bigger oil filters.

I’m sure there are not any back to back flow tests or anything like that but I would love to know how restrictive the stock oil filter housing is.


Coop

[mjannusch]

The passages in the oil pump itself are probably more restrictive than the passages in the filter housing.

You can put a longer filter on, but I'd be careful about going too long. Jack T. had an incident where an object struck his longer filter on track. I think there was one that was an inch or so longer, and another that was a couple inches longer. The longer of the two is too long, IMO.

I'd be interested in the pressure drop across a new filter, and see if there are other filters available with less pressure drop but still filter well, and don't bypass quite as easily.

[DCIV]

Has no one ever tried modifying the pump housing itself? Doesn’t seem like I’ve ever heard of it if so.


Coop

[mjannusch]

Yeah, I remember seeing some mod that would basically replace the oil filter housing with AN fittings and hose and loop the output to the galley plug on the back of the block or something like that. That crazy guy on 3Si with the bizzarre trans input shaft brake idea I think brought it up.

You might be able to do some minor flow mods to the pump itself, but there’s a lot of things there that are they way they are for balance. You want to be able to provide pressure, but also need to provide enough flow at that pressure. Honestly, I don’t think Mitsu did that bad of a job on the oiling system. A lot of these cars don’t get the maintenance they need (regular oil/filter changes) and just get run until something goes wrong.

The only thing I was a bit worried about was high RPM pump gear failure, but fixed that by doing a stroker that won’t be revved as high. I have a set of billet pump gears also, but turns out you can’t trust those either.

Tough to win...

[DCIV]

Matt did the oil filter mod on his stroker race car. The guy over seas did, I can keep going, I’ve seen a handful of them over the years. Matt was just so “dont do it unless it’s needed” that makes me think there is something to this.


Coop