Cold Starting Long Standing Engines

I made a shaft to prime small block Mopar engines by taking an old oil pump drive, and grinding the teeth off of it so it clears the cam. Then use a drill clockwise with a rod with a flat machined into the end of it to fit the pump shaft. I had to pre oil a 4.7 motor for my wife's Dakota, and I built a pressure oiler out of a 3' piece of schedule 80 PVC. I glued a cap on the bottom, and tapped it for a 1/2" fitting with a nipple to attach a clear hose. I plumbed a gate valve in it too. I glued a sewer cleanout on top, and drilled and tapped the screw in plug for a 3/8 male air chuck. I figured out which way to plumb the hose from the bottom of it, so it would feed oil thru the filter and into the motor like it normally does. I filled the PVC pipe with 6 qt's of new oil, hooked up the air hose with the compressor regulator being pre set at 40 lbs pressure, and opened the gate valve so it would force the oil thru the motor. The oil pressure gauge I had temporarily hooked up instantly went to 40 lbs psi oil pressure. I rolled the motor over by hand to get the oil to the top end. Here's where I screwed up and didn't do like @413 said and put the valve covers on! On the second round of rotating the motor by hand....oil shot out the top end and got all over the car cover on my Challenger conv sitting 5' away from the engine on the stand! I guess I said all that to say this....if you need a pressure oiler for the little motor, you can build one for around $40 with stuff from Home Depot or Lowes. You don't need one for the 273.....just a drill and a helper. Good luck with it.

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