Need help with recuring problems

[94 formula]

About 4k miles ago my car was acting funny so I pulled over and popped the hood to find that my manifolds were so hot they were glowing. I ended up determening it to be caused by my car running incredibly lean due to a large rip in my intake elbow after the MAF. I replaced it with a 1LE intake elbow and everything ran great for about 500 miles until I noticed my oil pressure dropping when I got on the gas hard so I replaced the oil pump which has worked fine for me....until last night. I was on a back road with a friend I was pushing the car pretty hard for about 2 or 3 minutes when I noticed my oil pressure start to drop when I got it up around 4000 rpms (it dropped from around 75psi down to around 55 or 60 psi). Then it began to feel sluggish and started missing. I pulled over and popped my hood and my manifolds were glowing red again. I let it cool down for a good half hour and checked my intake elbow which was seated on fine. I drove it home and it seemed to run fine. What could be causing this can they be related problems? As of 4000 miles ago I had good gas pressure and have put on a new gas filter. I think I'm running incredibly lean but don't know why and the oil pump just confuses me.

[Rob B (shoebox)]

Glowing manifolds usually means unburned fuel in the exhaust manifold that is igniting. You are running rich and not lean. How are your O2 sensors?

[Dave M]

55 or 60 psi is not low for oil pressure, not even at 4000 rpms. 75 seems high to me, 55 or 60 more normal for that rpm. If anything needs to be done about it, maybe a new oil pressure sending unit?

[TraceZ]

55 or 60 psi is not low for oil pressure, not even at 4000 rpms. 75 seems high to me, 55 or 60 more normal for that rpm. If anything needs to be done about it, maybe a new oil pressure sending unit?

I second that. I've never seen the pressure in any of my LT1 cars get that high. It could be the sender unit is sticky. Replace that and your O2 sensors maybe??

[Mike71]

just a heads up..if ur 02 sensors are shot u should replace it ASAP to save ur cats

i have had more then one friend burn out a cat because of the darned 02 sensor

[94 formula]

I don't have to worry about my cat because there is not one there lol. My uncle owns a garage and hooked my car up to his computer a few months ago and said the 02s are fine but they do have 100k on them. I also have an exhaust leak before the sensor on the right side that is pretty bad. Could that cause a bad reading. I'm installing a set of LT headers either this weekend or next should I just replace the sensors while I'm at it?

[N20LT4Bird]

An exhaust leak before the O2's can cause false O2 readings, but I dont think that is what is causing your manifolds to glow after WOT runs. I would double check fuel pressure (maybe the regulator came disconnected?). I would also look at my MAF/MAP readings on a scanner and watch the O2's to see what the mixture ia actually doing.

[Detroit_Bird]

Dont forget- advanced ignition timing can cause a rise in combustion temps as well as a lean condition. Kinda hard to verify on these cars, but if you're out of answers it might be worth a shot.