VX 16v Apollo Tank

[John_Salmon]

I have noisey tappets after a high speed run on a wet sump car.

Should i fit an apollo tank or a oil cooler.

 

Has anyone fitted an apollo to a vx and is there a downside? i.e loss of oil preassure

 

I have tried various oils and now use mobile 1 15/50

[stevefoster]

I personally don't know of anybody who has Apollo'd a VX. That's not to say it's not been done.

Mine suffered aeration and tappet rattle under extreme conditions (racing and slicks).

It happened at the 2nd race meeting and after the 5th race. Before that all had been fine.

Oil pressure was always good at 3.5bar.

I wondered if I had overfilled it and this caused windage of the oil by the crank hitting it...

To put this problem to rest I fitted a dry sump system. Very good, no more problems.

The pressure never drops below 4 bar now, no matter how hard it we are pushing. So I must deduce that with the same pressure pump the 3.5 bar was caused by aeration or surge and the Caterham branded oil pressure gauge so slow tho react that it sat at 3.5 bar when in reality could have been below or above that for some of the time.

 

/Steve

 

My racing pics, 7 DIY, race prep. Updated often here

Hants (North) and Berkshire area club site

here

 

 

Edited by - stevefoster on 18 Sep 2002 09:24:26

[Alex Wong1697456877]

I suffered all sorts of surge and suspected aeration problems with my 2.0 Vx. Dry sumping was expensive but has been worth it.

[Mike Bey]

How does aeration occur? I have seen what look like lots of little air bubbles in the oil on my dipstick. Would this be aeration, & if so, what's the solution?

 

Oil pressure gets as low as 2.5 bar.

 

Mike

[stevefoster]

Oooh that is low if you have the Caterham

slow to react gauge. The VDO ones are much quicker = good in my book.

 

The oil gets aerated by being used it should return to a nice deep sump and have time to settle to solid liquid before going round again... Got the Sugarbabes 'Round round' song in my head at the moment....

 

Unfortunately the Caterham sump is shallow due to the nature of the car.

I thought the Caterham foam baffle solution stood up well to my attempts to race it on slicks. It was always fine for the road and track with 021's on for example.

Have you had the sump off to see what it looks like.

As a thought check that you have a windage plate. You should be able to see block, gasket, windage plate, gasket, sump in the sandwich on inspection

 

 

/Steve

 

My racing pics, 7 DIY, race prep. Updated often here

Hants (North) and Berkshire area club site

here

 

[John_Salmon]

Thanks for the advise, i think i do have airation of the oil and my next project will be to fit an Apollo Tank.

If i fit a sandwich plate this will drop the filter to the same level as the front of the sump, although this is nearly on the centre line of the front wheels. will this give me ground clearance problems or should i consider a remote filter.