picked up an ;85 subaru wagon cheap. needs oil pump work was running with no pressure for a while. some opinions on engine damage would help. i've heard they can take alot of abuse. thanks, lunchbox

Id think you would need to take it apart to know the extent. Does it run and drive as it sits.

You're not using the gauge on the dash alone to diagnose this are you?

Befor you get too far ahead, are you sure it actually had 0psi of oil pressure?

If it actaully was getting no oil pressure it would sound pretty bad. A couple of minutes of run with out oil pressure on a worn in motor probably would do little damage, but if it was being driven... I dosent sound good.

like mentioned, the gauges aren't very accurate.

 

how did you diagnose it "ran low on oil" or whatever?

 

if it actually ran low on oil the engine is probably toast. but unlikely that happened.

 

have you drained the oil? i'd do that and try to sift it or look at it closely to see if there's metal shavings in there.

 

if it was run low on oil, the ones i've seen incurred significant damage to the oil pump and cams. so you could pull the oil pump and valve covers to inspect, that's at least easy. once i see that, i scrap the engine. not worth rebuilding cost wise.