Hi,
I'm having a little bit of confusing problem with the oil pressure on my 59 235. I bought an engine that had been sitting for about 20 years under a work bench without any oil in it. After cleaning the motor and putting some fresh oil in it, I put it in my 48 3100. The engine started ok but didn't appear to have any oil pressure. I dropped the pan and found that the oil pump pick up was filled with sludge. After cleaning the pickup tube and screen, I put the pan back and some fresh oil back in the motor and ran the pump with a drill for about a minute until oil was coming out of the rockers. I made the assumption that the problem was corrected. Wrong! When I put the distributor back in and started it, there is still no oil pressure. I checked the filter and copper line going to head and no oil is flowing to the top end when the engine is running. I pulled the distributor and ran the pump with the drill for about 10 seconds and oil is pumped back up to the filter and head???? Any ideas what's wrong? Is the pump bad? This one has me stumped.