Over the last week or so my oil pressure gauge has a mind of it's own at idle. Normally i idle 3 - 3.5bar using 10/50 oil, when ever i accelerate it shoots up to 7bar (gauge max) and holds firm. Over the last or so it isn’t stable at idle, it jumps around from 3 bar to 5 bar (never below 3), if I’m on the move again it appear fine and sails up to 7bar again. Worried it could be the sign of a large repair bill...

 

I'm not trying to worry you but no boubt this will.

In the days of the GTIR my gauge started to act funny. Under boost the oil pressure would increase. I figured it was the sensor, so i bought a new one. That did the same. So i tried a mates gauge as we bought them in a group buy... did the same.

I checked the car over and couldn't find anything wrong.. it ran fine, boosted fine everything was fine.

Then! I think it was the next day (all this happened over about 4 days) i was driving hard out of town to my mates when out of the vent on the bonnet came white/blue smoke. I stopped there and then and opened the bonnet.

The dip stick was pushed out of the engine and there was oil everywhere. To cut the story a bit shorter basicaly the turbo was fcuked and it was causing crankcase compression.

I hope your problem is something as simple as the gauge/sensor being dodgy but if not then the above could be your problem... its actually quite hard to diagnose and many tuning companys insisted it was a worn crank and wanted me to send the block to them to check it over. By good fortune my best mate is a fantastic mechanic and got it right first time.

 

hi mate

my oil pressure gauge needle started jumping about erratically recently,turned out to be a goosed sender.
Now reads ok again like yours did originally 3/3.5 bar at idle and 6.5/7 under acceleration
hope it turns out to be something simple

 

Crumbs . Well fingers crossed a new sender as Matt suggested cures the problem because i'd rather it not be similar to your's.

Thanks for the replies guys.