Oil Pan Performance - What Features Do You Want?
 

For the 2nd Gen owners, what kind of features are at the top of your list when shopping around for a high-performance oil pan? Better baffling? More Capacity? A second drain port for an oil temp sensor? A port for a turbo drain? Anything else?

We're always looking for feedback from the enthusiast and track community :)

If this will fit first gen, put me on the pre order list for whatever this becomes

Baffling or whatever to keep the oil feed with oil and it doesn't starve in curves

1. 2nd port for turbo or AOS drain
2. More baffling. But not using rubber/polymer trap door flaps that can break off
3. Able to use stock oil pick up, which i do think is a good light design (at least its not the welded shit of EJ20/25 of old (yes i did buy you KB oil pick up years ago hahah).
4. Ability to use gasket instead of RTV for sealing.
5. Something light enough (cast alu like your EJ20/25 one) and doesnt rust after years.
6. Dun think a bigger or deeper pan is good since it will limit header choice and ground clearance respectively.
7. Dun think a separate bung for oil temp.is necessary since stock already has oil temp sensor, and one can still use the oil gallery or the old Tee off the front of the block for another oil temp sensors (or of cause a sandwich plate).
8. Probably useless but some cast in fins give a nice placebo effect to it giving that bit more cooling for the oil hahaah.

OTS Gasket...

We don't have one here unfortunately. We can look at part numbers to get a ballpark, but the pickup for certain is different from Gen 1 to 2.

Would a baffle plate be preferred over a full pan?

Good list, thanks!

This is one I don't agree on, only because every single Subaru oil pan gasket we've used (and o-ring seals) fails over the long term.

That said we do use pans with custom o-ring seals, but only for dyno testing oiling products. It just saves a ton of time when you're pulling the oil pan every 12 pulls over and over and... That said, we've done high end racing oil pans with o-ring seals, but these are engines that get pulled after 3 20-minute rally stages, or after a handful of drag passes.

Although, I am open to continue the debate.

Additionally, you'd get no less than a pristine sealing surface on our oil pans, and the flange will be much stronger than OEM. What this means is you only need a fractional amount of sealant compared to the OEM pan. The amount of sealant that gets squeezed out between the block and pan is very little compared to OEM. If you've done this a lot (or practice) you can make it so no sealant oozes out at all and it seals just fine.

You have far more experience than I, but I know my 'vision' would have been a pan that is stiff enough (cast with a thick flange) and has a recessed section machined into it for an o-ring style gasket to be seated in..

Not sure, but it sounds like you have tried this without success as well though..

Full pan could be a nice option, plug & play

Is it possible to add a drain that can act as an inspection window for the oil pickup? Like place it so you can look up into the pickup.

I would be in for an extra plug for oil temps, and extra capacity. Just bring it up so refill when changing oil and the filter is 6 US qts.

Interesting idea, but I'm not sure I'd want the lowest point (drain) to be at the oil pick-up, especially if you use a magnetic plug (I like to in all my cars) to help collect metal particles..

Dont have a 2nd gen but I always wished for the following features for the 1st gen oil pan:

-integrated internal multi-tiered baffling to help with oil starvation, with no flappy parts and cutouts for oem pickup
-external bottom fins with more surface area for extra oil cooling to help with oil pressure
-same dimensions/capacity as Oem to fit aftermarket headers
-better/stronger mating design to prevent RTV seeping into the interior when mated
-slight bottom angle V slant towards the drain to ensure most oil is drained

Coming from the 997 with a deep sump, I'm a fan of increasing capacity. I'd wishlist removable baffle plates, too, for those of us running baffles already.

LRN - valid point, but I'd still rather put the drain plug directly under the oil pick up point so we can throw a bore scope right up there during oil changes to check for clogged RTV.

It was my vision too! It's one of those things that sounds good in theory, but not in practice. Short term only. I believe it has to do with the expansion of the block and pan at slightly different rates that causes the o-ring to slip. The adhesive gasket doesn't slip at all. In fact, the bolts are really only necessary until the adhesive is cured if it's done right. On the EJ's some prefer the adhesive because they feel the pan provides additional block support and that bonds prevents them from slipping. I don't know if I buy that though, and on a BRZ there aren't many people making 800+whp, when that might matter.


OK


Keep in mind that by putting a drain under the oil pickup you are going to be reducing ground clearance some. Hopefully there is plenty of room to the belly pan.


I like nice round numbers too. If anyone's car burns oil they will be SOL :lol:


It would likely be an additional port. I'm a big fan of Fumoto Valves so just a single port facing down wouldn't work for me ;)

On the magnetic plugs... I know a LOT of people use them, but have you ever actually tested before/after when using one? A company reached out to us (one of the premier brands of magnetic plugs) wanting us to carry and promote their product, but we don't sell anything we don't test ourselves. So, they sent 3 units for us to test, and they went into 3 shop cars. We have oil analysis results on every new can we get, since break-in so we had a good baseline for 'normal'. Every car/engine had worse results when using the magnetic plugs. The results were so different, and across the board for all cars, that I assumed there was another factor at play like season changes or something. So, we repeated the test, but the results were the same. After pulling the plugs out of all the cars, the results went back to their normal range. This testing took ~18 months to complete. I sent our findings to the magnetic plug company and never even got a response back. In the meantime, I've come across other reports from places like Blackstone Labs that had very similar results.

Why? I don't know, but here's my best speculation... The magnetic plugs absolutely hold debris. There's no doubt about that, but that debris would normally be caught in the filter (OEM down to 5 micron). A magnet can only hold do much. It doesn't matter how strong your magnet is, there are only so many paper clips you can hang from it. When there is a good bit of debris on that magnet, and you start the car dead cold, some of that debris comes off with the cold thick oil. It then bypasses the oil filter, because the bypass opens at cold start. So, debris that normally would have been trapped by the oil filter, is now freely circulating through the engine, causing additional wear while the oil filter bypass is open. Again, I have zero factual evidence of this, it's just theory. The results were just so compelling and repeatable I feel others would want to hear about it.


I'll be scratching my head for a bit on this one. Fins, more capacity, more baffling, but no increase in size. It's a good challenge :)


Personally, I'm a fan of increased capacity over baffles and definitely over fins. Fins get you scene points but do zero for any measurable cooling (we've tried). On the other hand, what does get you improved cooling is more oil. With the EJs we see a 20-30° drop in temps. While it's not going to save you if you REALLY need an oil cooler because you're an open class time attack car making crazy power, for the rest of us it adds a level of comfort if you're on the fence about needing one. With the FA24, I'd expect the temp drop to me more conservative 10-20°