Jumpy Oil pressure Gauge

[Regal_GS_1989]

I've got an 89 Regal GS with the full digital instrument cluster. Recently, the oil pressure guage reads full pressure, even when the engine is off. Sometimes the gauge will jump sparraticaly when i'm at idle, or driving down the highway. Does anyone know if it is the oil pressure sensor or maybe a cracked wire.

[digitaloutsider]

It's the sensor. It's right next to the oil filter.

[maybe2fast]

what motor? on the 3.1 it is right next to the oil filter and thats what mine was doing! just replace it, aftermarket is fine, mine was updated and smaller, pretty accurate, more than the stock one

[WhiteOut]

It sounds as though you may actually have an electrical short. Does using an of the cars electrical options cause the guage to jump around noticably (i.e using power windows?). If so then you probably have an electrical short which won't be fun to track down.

 

I believe that when the oil pressure sending unit dies the guage should read 0 psi since the sensor will fail to generate any voltage at all and thus cause the sensor not to register. You can usually buy a brand new sending unit for around $30 or so, and they aren't too hard to replace should you decide to try that route.

[jeremy]

I would guess sensor, but try what WhiteOut says and let us know the results....

[Brian P]

actually, sometimes when the sensor dies, it reads max. Or will read max on occasion, like my '89 Cutlass did. The sensors don't last forever, I'm going to go with the sensor for $500, Alex.

[midnight rider]

Bad sensor, replace it and move on... lol