Did I wreck my Volvo Penta Diesel?

My 1987 Sisu has a 140 hp turbo Volvo Penta inboard diesel with only 425 hours.

After changing the oil and filter and starting it up for first time this season, there was no oil pressure and the alarm is ringing. Gauges have been sometimes funny to “activate” in the past, so, being at times stupid and stubborn, I kept running the engine waiting for the oil pressure gauge to jump to life. The engine ran perhaps a minute at various RPMs.

Of course, the real problem was a loose oil filter and I managed to pump 8 quarts of fresh oil into the bilge from my 9 quart sump. (Don’t believe the “turn one rotation after contact” directions) After shut down, I opened the oil fill cap and there was plenty of oil in the top still circulating. Then, we probably over tightened the oil filter and refilled the sump and things seemed to run normally.

After some run time, oil pressure gauge was moving between 0 and a maximum of 30 psi no matter what RPM. Actually seemed to sway with the swells. Oil level remained at full.

Did I wreck my engine? Could it be something simple like a bubble I the sensor? What do I do now?

 

NO.............to make it short. But you probably shortened the lifetime, but thats difficult to say how much.

First find out what is the trouble with your (obviously) damaged or clogged gauges.

 

In addition to Apex: instrument signals swaying with boat movements = signal cable broken or loose, often close to the sender. Instrument and alarm senders both get 12 V from a small relay, see your engine manual. I would not run my engine without functioning instrumentation.