The oil pressure light should come on every time the ignition is turned on and it turns off after oil pressure is present. 

If the oil cooler is preventing pressure from reaching the lifters they will collapse and then the engine will make noise and run poorly due to lack of valve lift. 

Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of Rocket J Squirrel
Sent: Sunday, May 22, 2011 7:09 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Can this do that?

I just installed tencentlife's external oil cooler kit. The instructions were to then start the engine, wait for the oil pressure lamp to go out, then shut it off and top off the oil.

The oil pressure lamp never came on, so I let the engine run and idle a few moments, then shut it off.

Is there a way to test the oil pressure lamp?

I check the oil level and before we started the work, the oil was just above the lower notch on the dipstick. Now it was off the bottom end. So I put in a quart and re-started the engine.

It sounded like crap. Couldn't hold a idle, rattled like drained down hydraulic lifters. Shut it off, check oil level. Still below the dipstick, added more, restarted. Could barely idle. There were gulping sounds coming out of the oil filler neck.

Shut off, add more oil now it's above the lower notch and idling and sounding fine.

Could low oil level cause the thing to struggle so?

PS -- so far no drops, and once the engine gets warm, the external cooler heats right up, indicating functioning thermostat action.

--
Rocky J Squirrel
'84 Westfalia: Mellow Yellow ("The Electrical Banana")
'74 Westrailia: (Ladybug Trailer company, San Juan Capistrano, Calif.) Bend, OR KG6RCR