u/Ifuqinhateit

Here’s the Apex VS-5RS 17x8.5 wheels in Motorsport Gold w/ Falken Azenis RT615K+ 225/45/17 on stock tS suspension and alignment and no spacers. Will be installing Verus camber plates and dialing in -2.5° and 0 toe in the front.

I’ve been logging oil pressure on my 2026 BRZ tS and using the Ansix oil pressure sensor kit, I found something interesting.

I captured oil-pressure telemetry as a baseline with the stock system and 0W-20.

On July 11, filtering for oil ≥194°F and RPM ≥4,000:

• Median pressure: ~78 psi
• 5th percentile: ~68 psi
• One particularly interesting transient: ~80 psi → 35 psi → ~82 psi at ~4,700 rpm
• Oil temp was ~221°F
• Lateral acceleration was only ~0.18 G
• Pressure recovered very quickly
• There were a couple of other less-severe low-pressure events at low lateral G
• I also saw ~61 psi during ~1.1 G cornering

The 35 psi event is the one I find interesting because it occurred with almost no lateral acceleration. That makes pickup uncovering from oil slosh seem unlikely.

The car subsequently received:

• A clean pickup
• Formula Delta high-capacity baffled pan
• Ansix water-to-oil cooler
• 5W-30

What has changed dramatically is pressure behavior under normal hot/high-RPM operation.

On a recent Tail of the Dragon run:

• Oil ≥194°F / RPM ≥4,000
• 37,459 samples
• Median pressure: 85.2 psi
• 5th percentile: 81.0 psi
• Minimum: 77.1 psi
• Zero samples below 60 psi
• Max lateral G: ~+0.93 / -1.18 G
• Max oil temp: ~210°F

AutoX data after the changes also showed very strong pressure despite ~1.2+ G and RPM approaching 7,500.

The improved overall pressure after the work could then be a combination of:

1. Clean/unrestricted pickup
2. 5W-30 instead of 0W-20
3. Cooler oil from the water-to-oil cooler

Questions for anyone familiar with FA24 oiling systems:

Has anyone else used an oil pressure sensor telemetry system with a stock setup and captured a meaningful dataset and seen a similar behavior?

Is anyone else willing to purchase and install the Ansix pressure sensor kit to gather a meaningful dataset with an unmodified car to see if they see similar behavior?

If this behavior is not a result of a telemetry malfunction and others are seeing similar events without high lateral acceleration, it’s possible there there is another cause of these engine failures we keep seeing other than forgetting to change the oil or not adding oil when it’s low.

My current theory is the stock oil cooler is insufficient and is contributing to low pressure events and along with one or more other contributing factors can cause hydrodynamic lubrication failure and create many micro damage events that, over time, lead to engine failures.

My 26 BRZ tS w/ 1400 miles on the Odometer is at the shop getting a Formula Delta oil pan installed. I was very particular on the break in process changing the oil at 650 miles and not revving past 4k until after 1k miles.

During the oil pan installation process, the shop sent me this picture of the excessive RTV in the pickup. I know it’s not catastrophic and it wasn’t causing low pressure because I installed the Ansix oil pressure sensor and everything seemed fine. I just want to provide this datapoint to back up what u/rdsolns wrote in his post “PSA, Drop your pans:” https://www.reddit.com/r/GR86/comments/1u1mqr0/psa_drop_your_pan_on_your_new_gr86/

If you don’t take your car to the track, it’s almost certainly not a problem, but if you plan to track your car, or engage in sustained high G right hand turns, I highly recommend the following:

Formula Delta high Capacity pan that allows you to clean out the pickup during each oil change

Ansix water to oil cooler

Ansix oil pressure sensor kit

5-30 oil w/ 500mL overfill

Verus also makes a high capacity pan, but it requires header heat shield cutting or removal. It’s also only sold as a prototype and not cast aluminum like the FxD pan. Baffles are not sufficient as the data suggests the oil starvation problem is a capacity and temperature problem.

I recognize lots of people track their GR86s and BRZs without doing these mods and haven’t blown up their engine, yet. However, it is concerning to see how much is in the pickup after only 1400 miles and also the amount of RTV squeezed into the oil pan cavity. It’s impossible to conclude the RTV causes low oil pressure, but it’s also easy to see how it could contribute in long tail scenarios.

It’s not cheap to fortify the engine with these mods, but it’s cheaper than the alternative.

EDIT: Apparently Reddit’s GR86 community thinks RTV in the pickup is fine and you should just leave it in there when changing the oil pan for track use. Also, 500mL overfill is sufficient for track use and installing mods to fix deficiencies of the engine are a waste of money. Got it, thanks everyone!

We’re gonna have a blast together.