Tomorrow im going to put the plugs and wires in and add some seafoam and see what happens. Do I need to do a couple of treatments of seafoam the next couple of oil changes or should 1 treatment take care of it? I've never used it before.

 

Thanks guys ran the seafoam through and changed the oil and put new wires and plugs while I was at it and the car starts and runs fine now.

 

Ok back to the starting point again. Did the engine treatment and tune up everything went fine for a week or so. Went to take the car to work yesterday started tapping very loudly and the oil pressure went up and down repeatedly for around 45 seconds to a minute and then everything smooths out including the oil pressure like nothing has happened. Does this mean its definitely my oil pump or the strainer?

 

I do not think so it sound to me based on your description that your idle rpms are falling too low. How does the motor react when it is doing this and you just touch the gas? if everything smooths out my guess would be you need a good throttle body cleaning. Which is part of a good tune up. Sticking or dirty EGR is also a good fit. Again step one would be a good cleaning of the EGR valve.

There is risk involved with seafoam or any other cleaner. If the motor is real sludged up the clearner will seem to help but it can dislodge more problems. I have had customers go through serveral oil changes before they where happy with the results. I am not a big fan of running the car in normal use with cleaners in it. I like to put it in and run it for awhile (maybe a day) then swap in nice clean oil.

I have a friend who bought a sludged up motor and we ran kerosene in it instead of oil (just warmed it up at idle) we had to do it twice. The first time we had to clean the drain hole out with a screw driver twice while draining the kerosene. I do not recommend doing that unless your to the point you going to tear it down anyway. He was burning oil cause the oil could not return from the heads. His motor ran for 2 years before spining a bearing.