black chunks jamming oil pump?????
 

I am stumped by the problem I am having with my 67 plymouth Belvedere. The car has a 1973 440.. mildly built ( by previous owner) and I keep twising off oil pump drive shafts when these little black chunks find their way into the oil pump. Has any one ever had this happen before with a mopar big block? Where could the black chunks ( looks kind of like plastic) be coming from? Shouldnt the oil pump pick up screen be filtering this stuff out? I really need some help here I really dont want to have to tear the engine down its just a weekend play toy. My plan is to pull pan, pick up tube and pump... clean all and try to clean gallery between tube and pump. assuming screen is intact on pickup tube... should this fix the problem??!! I have twisted off 3 pump drive shafts (thankfully i had laying around) I was hoping that what ever the little chunks were they had cleared out by now, apparently I was wrong. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
thanks,
David Everhart

Did the old BB's have nylon coated cam gears?

Time for a new pick up screen.

i know that mine has a metal cam gear
maybe the 70's version had different ones
never had this happen to me

Thanks for all the help guys. I plan to pull the oil pan tomorrow and check the pick up screen. I guess I will also pull the valve covers and look for missing valve seals. What's the procedure for replacing the seals? In the event they are missing...

Do you have a compressor? Mr. Power was right as hell about the pick up screen, shit that big shouldnt even get to the pump.

I pulled the pan and although I can not find a hole in the screen of the pick up tube... it does appear to be tweaked a bit.... I cleaned out everything and will be ordering a new pick up tube and oil pump drive shaft. So now my question is... do I have to pull the heads and replace valve guide seals? Or can that wait? Going to try to post the pics I have of the junk in the tube

Once again, do you have a compressor?