Hey again
So I was looking into my ticking sound and oulled the valves cover to clean push rods and rocker arms and it would seem that I am not getting oil up too at all. Where should I be looking to fix this?

Here is the oiling system on a hydraulic slant six:



First pull the rocker arm assembly and look down the hole for the rearmost rocker arm shaft mount. The oil feed hole for the valve train is in the hole for the rocker arm shaft bolt. You may need to get a pipe cleaner and clean it out.

Second, make sure the rocker arm shaft and rocker arms are not full of caked up sludge. You may need to take them to a machine shop and get them hot tanked. The oil should flow fairly steadily from the tips of the rocker arms above the valve stems wen the motor is running.

Is this an all stock hydraulic motor or has there been mixing and matching of any components?

Thanks reed. The shaft and arms have been cleaned and were a little dirty. Not bad though. That hole in the shaft...should i be able to clean it out without removing anything else? Where will the sludge go?

As far as I know, the engine is all hydraulic. Bought it listed as out of an 84 dodge truck.

EDIT: working on cleaning out that passage. I can only get a pipe cleaner in so far and then it gets stuck. Not sure how I'm going to get it clear. Suggestions? It enters about 3 1/4" before stopping.

You should be able to strip the rocker arm shaft bare, put it over a bucket, and squirt cleaner in the holes near the top of the shaft and have the goo and sludge run out of the holes at the bottom of the shaft.

The oil feed hole in the back of the head should be a straight shot down to the cam journal feed. I don't know exactly how many inches this is, but if your pipe cleaner/probe doesn't go at least 3-4 inches into the hole, you may need to pull the head to check for head gasket misalignment or a blockage in the head passage. It is also possible for the #4 cam bearing to be spun or installed incorrectly so the oil flow is blocked.

Can you measure how far down the probe gets before it won't move any more?

Just edited my last post with just that info! About 3 1/4" down.

That's about the distance from the rocker stand to the top of the camshaft.
If it's stock there may be no hole to catch the pipe cleaner and check cam journal alignment (just a groove to let the oil around).

If you want to have a little fun, pull all the spark plugs and the coil wire and roll the engine over with the starter and see if you get a burp of oil out of that hole... (on good engines-i.e. clear galley and good oil pump you'll have a nice large 'glop' of oil spurt out of the hole....if after a few revolutions you get nothing you might check to make sure that the pump is actually working....).

-D.Idiot

I just measured on the back of a slant I have on a stand in my garage. My rough estimate is that with the rocker arm shaft removed you should be able to insert a probe about 10.5 inches down that oil supply hole before it runs into the cam. Stopping at just over 3 inches suggests to me that the hole in the head gasket is not lining up with the holes in the head ad block. You might ned to pull your head after all. Can you get a long thin piece of metal down the hole to punch through the head gasket?

Now you guys have got me confused lol. One of ya is saying that the 3 1/4 is okay and the other is saying 10 1/2 lol. Big difference.
This engine has 100 some k on it and is not a rebuild. Makes me think the head gasket thing is a long shot.
I did try rolling the engine over to see if any oil came up without the coil connected and I got nothing at all. Guess I should check my pump?

Its possible he rear cam bearing has moved,happened to me years ago,the engine had a very dry valve train.When I stripped it down the rear cam bearing had moved enough to block the oil hole.

Glad Reed has his hands on, he's got the correct measurement.

I typically run a coat hanger through the passages in the head and the block to check them before assembling an engine and just plain went blond....

I think Reed's assessment sounds correct that the oiling hole is non-existent in the head gasket or is mis-aligned or plugged... Try a coat hanger with the end sharpened (either grinder, file, or sidewalk...) and take a stab at it (or a long undersized bit may work in seeing what crud comes out of the passage if it's clogged not blocked.

-D.Idiot

3 1/2" to get to the block top, another 5 1/2" to the cam. I think you should be able to use the starter to pump oil, if you had oil pressure before you started all this checking.

Richard

_________________
Part of Tyrde-Browne Racing

Just to be perfectly clear:



DI's coathanger idea sounds like a good one. If you can, sharpen the point a bit.

If you can't see the edge of the head gasket obviously poking out from the side of the block, then I think the head gasket either doesn't have the hole or the gasket was install upside down.
HEY! I'm a blonde!

Remember this? Cause I'm a blonde

Reed is correct I measured a head off a block wrong, should be 4 3/4" from bottom of shaft to block surface.
If you have an broken speedo cable try to fish out some of the goo,


Richard

_________________
Part of Tyrde-Browne Racing

I actually have a copy of that on vinyl (thanks to Dr.Demento's compilations...), along with her other favorite at the time "The
Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun..."(which after the 90's really
isn't funny anymore...)

-D.Idiot

Tried poking around to see if I could sneak through the gasket and it just wasn't happening. So I pulled the head. I can out the cost hanger right through the oil galley in the head no problem and down about 7" into the block here:


Just for my sanity, that is the right hole yes?
So...have I found my problem? Head or gasket misaligned?