FS - 2008 Chevrolet Trailblazer

[balactm]

Well I drove the car to buddies house last night to keep the battery up.

Leaving the house, I started the car (which drove fine 3 hours earlier) and it immediately threw a CEL. I didn’t think much of it, this thing threw a CEL for evap emissions occasionally. Backing out of the spot, the oil pressure gauge starts jumping, reading fine, then 0, then fine, then jumping everywhere between 0 and 50psi. I immediately pulled back in the spot and checked the oil level, just fine. Started the motor, listened to it, no lifter tick, sounds fine. Gauge is now reading correctly, 60 psi of pressure. I drive out of the neighborhood and start to get on the highway, it goes from reading 40-60 to 0 and stays there.

I figured that a connector got some water in it when I washed the engine bay and this is just electrical, engine sounds fine, I say F it and jump on the highway, where it made it about 3-4 miles with 0 pressure before seizing solid.

So don’t be me and trust your gauges children. If I had, I would have found the CEL was for both banks of cam position sensors being out of range (they are oil pressure driven.)

$600 anyone?

Dang, that happened to me offroading in my xterra, and I had just driven through a big ass mud hole, and assumed it was water on the sensor, shorting it out.

$0.02 thought: if it ever happens to you on another vehicle, take off the oil cap and see if you can see oil moving around. I did this and gave me about 50% confidence in making it off the mountain (better than 0% i guess).