Weird Problem - only seen once

[Tomer]

Just had this happen to me for the first time today. Was staring my cruise locally, was on the freeway, and engine temp was up to 190...I had the heat on but it was blowing cool air...I was fiddling with the controls, thinking, oh no, somehow the AC is on...I was a little confused, cuz outside temp was ~ 55 so I might just have been feeling outside air...

THEN, I noticed the oil pressure gauge was reading nearly zero, but it was above zero by about 3 needle widths...And in all the confusion I am sure the red ENGINE (not amber check engine) light was on too...

SO I pull her off the freeway at a 1/2 way safe spot and shut it down!!! Get out, check the oil, relief, full and clean as usual...THen I did a little manual check to see that the temp knob actually moves the control valve in the heater hose...Yes that works...

So thinking something is screwy and the engine is not ready to burn up from lack of oil pressure, I fire her up, and hit it...
Voila, I now have heat and oil pressure came up and indicated normal right from the restart...Took about a 30 minute cruise and did stop once to gab with a friend (turned car off for 20 min) and took off again, all is well...

Anyone ever hear tell of this weirdness...Note, my battery is new-ish, around 6 months since I replaced it...Everything else is working A-OK....I just don't understand what would cause the oil pressure gauge to all of a sudden indicate a false reading, then go back to proper operation...And the fact that I had the temp control all the way to the right, and selected floor/defrost, and was getting cold air...arghhhhhhhhhhhh...Gremlins???


Tomer
96 RT/10
PS I did the cycle ignition on-off on-off on to get codes from the computer, and it was a 12 (from when I changed battery) and 55, end of codes...

 

[Sean Roe]

The oil pressure gauge and the low oil presure warning light in the message center are on two seperate circuit with two seperate sensors. The warning light sensor goes closed circuit when below 8 psi. To have both come on at the same time warrants some checking into.

Sean

 

[Tomer]

THanks Sean!! Do you think I should just take it to a Viper Tech, as this is most likely some obscure problem...? Or are there some things that I can check myself, being generally dangerous (reasonably mechanical but without special/electronic tools).

Tomer

 

[TRAMP 13]

99 RT turn my heat on and it blowed out hot air also .Took it too the local dealer and found that where the valve is to change from cool to heat ,there was a piece of stroform that look like that junk you pack in boxes keeping the control from moving to heat ,the valve on the passenger side .Send the stroform to DC so they said.