1995 bonneville se, daugthers car 155,000 miles. she was coming home from school today and the oil pressure dropped. motor is making a bit of noise sounds like a main bearing. is this fixable by dropping oil pan , and replacing inserts or am i wasting my time

You can drop the pan and check the main bearings. If they hve spun it usually requires atleast a crank kit. Most of the time it is cheaper to just get a used lower mileage motor.

But yes, you can drop the pan to inspect the mains. Could you tell if the noise was coming from the bottom end?

no i havent verifed the sound coming from the bottom end .it was windy and raining also when i tried to start it .it would barley turn over but did start oil pressure is really down thou .

You can examine the main and rod bearings by dropping the pan, but if they turn out to be bad, you will want to pull the engine to repair it. When a bearing fails, typically, many pieces of debris end up distributed over the inside of the engine and oil gallery including the passages in the crank. These must be removed before there can be any expectation for normal service life following replacement of the damaged parts. Speaking of which, there is a good chance that a connecting rod may need to be machined or replaced. The cylinder head must be removed to change a rod. The crankshaft journal where the bearing failed will almost certainly need to be ground or polished to prevent the immediate deterioration of the new inserts. The crank can only be removed for repair with the engine in the car if the transmission is removed first.

All of the necessary work could be done with the engine in the car, but it is so much more difficult to do so, that it doesn't make sense to approach the job that way. If you simply change the inserts without disassembling, cleaning, checking, and restoring the related parts, there is a very low chance that the fix will last. It is much easier and more effective to perform that work with the engine out of the car, on a stand.

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1998 3.8 Dodge Caravan 214K
2000 3.3 Dodge Caravan 175K
1949 Plymouth Special Deluxe 4-dr sedan 25K (needs some work!)

Replacing the bearings with the motor in the car is not the way to go. The reasons are a long list that have been covered in other threads, so I'll skip repeating them, but the bottom line is if it needs a new bearing, it needs to be overhauled out of the car.

Drain the oil (look for metal in the oil), cut open the filter and look for metal. If you are finding a bunch of metal, then it's probably comming from bearings and it's time to start thinking about a new/used/rebuilt motor to take the place of the one you have.

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Bye Bye 1990 Bonneville LE... Now it belongs to my daughter
In the Garage: 2009 Subaru Outback, 1987 Camaro, 2006 SV650S, 1995 Regal 182 "ASANAGI", 1962 Ford Galaxie 500, 1995 Ford F150 XL 4WD, 1953 Farmall Cub

If you're looking for the root cause, it's very likely a lower intake manifold gasket failure or EGR stovepipe failure in the upper intake, allowing coolant to mix with the oil in the pan. It's very common on the Series 2 motors, especially the L36 (which we're talking about here).

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I agree with whats been posted, with an additional tidbit...

Cams/cranks/rods operate with minimal bearing clearances; they basically "float" on a thin layer of oil. As this layer gets larger, due to wear, it gets harder and harder to keep/hold oil pressure. Then the catch 22 begins: low oil pressure creates wear, wear reduces oil pressure.
The internal coolant problems add to this problem, as the coolant can corrode bearing materials.

Basically, if you do have low oil pressure and bearing damage, you need to either rebuild or replace. Give it a good once over just to make sure....

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1995 White Bonneville SE

188340 Miles as of 06/07/10, still running.........

LIM/UIM Work done 4/23/07 at 145000 miles...

Does it sound anything like this... You'll have to listen over the Intake... But this is from My L36 spinning the #4 rod bearing... When we got the motor out and apart it was a big mess of bearing material in the pan...

yes it was pretty much what i figured, it sounds just like jr3800 sound clip. i havent done any disassembly yet, mainley because its cold and icy. and i am leaning towards parting out instead. it is a very nice car thou ,iam confused i was fixing to have painted for her christmas present,has beautifull black leather interior and dent free but i have a short block in my 99 that was hydrolocked but it set for 8 months i have already tore it down past the heads maybe i should use that. what do you guys think part it or build another motor with the 99 short block. thanks for all you answers, roger

We would naturally like to see you rebuild it.
It will probably cost you at least $1,000 if you do it yourself but then you will know exactly what you have and get it done right.

I hate that sound! The sound of money getting crunched up between the piston and the crank.

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2000 SSEi - SilverBullet - 78,000 kms, 4" "straight shot" custom headlight ram air inlet, TOGs, 1.9's, Lsd, 2.9-3.4"MPS 10-15 psi, Ported GenV, EGR eliminated, OR pushrods, oil volume kit, trani cooler & shift kit, Titanium retainers, 90 lb springs, 160 Stat, 42# injectors, Fuel pump voltage increase, Wideband O2, 3" to dual 2 1/2" Magnaflows, Snow Meth/water injection, after SC temp gauge, 255/50WR17, timing commander set 15-18*@WOT, 2 speed Fan over-ride, disabled DRL, Solid motor mount, Meziere Electric water pump, adjustable fuel pressure regulator, Drilled & slotted rotors/ceramics, GXP sway bars and STB, Upgraded and rebuilt transmission with ZZP 2500 rpm stall TC, Pioneer Bluetooth stereo with sub and 800 W amps, PB 13.5 quarter, (April 2014 car of the month)

I agree with rebuilding the short block. In effect, you are giving her a new car then. The rest of these cars seem to last forever, besides the normal maintenance stuff. If you don't want to mess around rebuilding the engine yourself, it's pretty easy to find a lower mileage used one for pretty cheap. I found one with 80K for $700 and it came with a warranty. Do some research. But yeah, I say keep the car.

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'96 Bonneville SLE "Twilight" ( sold :( )
'72 Mustang Hardtop
'01 Grand Prix SE
'06 MINI Cooper S
'88 Ford Mustang Convertible (roller/for sale)

For me Locally I can fin the Series III L26 for pretty cheap and with very low miles... A couple of the good LKQ Yards have them for $300-$500... Mileage ranges from 7k to 60k and they are 05+ L26 engines... I will be using the L26 Longblock under L36 induction in my Van...

If you can find a really low mileage L26 it may be worth it over a rebuild..

On my L36 The Rod bearing actually chewed into the crank to the point that the Crank was garbage... The rod was also garbage.. And the piston was kissing the head slightly...



At Current I have a low mileage 1996 Bonneville L36 in my car... So far its been a good motor..

Pretty much the same for the 94 L67 also. New crank. New rod.
It's a new engine now! Complete long block rebuild for $2,500 with a one year warranty.

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2000 SSEi - SilverBullet - 78,000 kms, 4" "straight shot" custom headlight ram air inlet, TOGs, 1.9's, Lsd, 2.9-3.4"MPS 10-15 psi, Ported GenV, EGR eliminated, OR pushrods, oil volume kit, trani cooler & shift kit, Titanium retainers, 90 lb springs, 160 Stat, 42# injectors, Fuel pump voltage increase, Wideband O2, 3" to dual 2 1/2" Magnaflows, Snow Meth/water injection, after SC temp gauge, 255/50WR17, timing commander set 15-18*@WOT, 2 speed Fan over-ride, disabled DRL, Solid motor mount, Meziere Electric water pump, adjustable fuel pressure regulator, Drilled & slotted rotors/ceramics, GXP sway bars and STB, Upgraded and rebuilt transmission with ZZP 2500 rpm stall TC, Pioneer Bluetooth stereo with sub and 800 W amps, PB 13.5 quarter, (April 2014 car of the month)