Awhile ago the oil was changed when we converted my car back to TBI, I wanted to put synthethic in, but my parents told them to put whatever in it, and when I picked the car up, it had lifter tick. I had posted video's of my car idling and driving on YouTube, and another guy with a TBI, told me that my oil pressure seemed really low. I think it's idling around 15psi, and driving at 30? My video's will come up when you search "aarontheman38". So could cheap (possibly wrong weight) oil be the cause of the lifter tick and low oil pressure?Is it possible that it is two separate problems, bad pump, ticking lifter? Thanks guys. I bought Sea Foam hoping that changing the oil and adding that would quiet that lifter.

 

Stock motors wont develop that much oil pressure at idle and low engine speeds. It sounds like its still OK. As for the tick, it could be a variety of things, clogged lifter orafice, dirty oil check, lash out of adjustment, pressed in stud backing out, etc. You could isolate which one is ticking and try to readjust the lash and see if it goes away.

 

If you are going to change your rockers, you should pull all the lifters, disassemble and clean them with some carb dip. I know this means that you need to take off the intake but if I had a potentially bad lifter I would not be installing higher ratio rockers until I corrected that.

 

My old 305 showed low oil pressure (below 7psi) at idle, not good. Simply replaced the sending unit. Same motor showed about 17-19 at idle after sending unit replacement, acceptable. Not saying that's your problem just an example.

Possible lifter tick, and possible lifter and or flat tappet cam lobe wear. Both are common to the 305's and could also influnce the oil pressure reading.

Now is probably not the time to make a switch to expensive synthetic oils or go the other route, to cheap oil. Use a multi vis 5-30 dino oil that retains it's viscosity well. Keep in mind that there's such thing as a cure in a bottle for a tired motor or worn parts.

Good luck