Narrative:

During the last phase of our climb our left engine's oil psi sensor became inoperative. The plane is new and has had some quirks in the past. The read-out was amber dashes. The oil temperatures did not indicate a loss of oil pressure. We were close to the top of our climb and I elected to continue to see if a reduction in N1 would trigger a fix (techniques like this have worked in this plane). On taxi and takeoff all engine instruments were green in the normal operating ranges with no engine; or other; messages.during the last phase of the climb I looked in the abnormal procedures checklist which didn't have this exact situation. It had only a checklist for amber colored digits. That checklist called for a reduction in power leading to a securing (shutdown) of the affected engine. It appeared that the sensor was at fault; but there was no way to know for sure. The corresponding circuit breaker was in the normal position. No attempt to reset it was made until on the ground which proved to not cause a difference. The oil temperatures between the affected and non-affected engines were within two degrees celsius. However; I learned after the matter that at FL400 the oil temperature of the affected engine; if a loss of oil pressure had been the case; may not have risen because of the ambient atmospheric conditions at that altitude.after consulting with maintenance on the ground; via onboard wi-fi; we decided to divert to [a nearby airport]. The decision to divert came approximately 35 minutes into our flight or within 5 minutes of our cruise phase.the G3000 book describes the amber dashes as 'values outside the valid range.' again; the engine operated like normal; but it could not be determined if it would stay that way which lead to our diversion.when we began our descent I pulled the affected engine to idle. As we got closer to [our diversion airport] we followed the engine precautionary shutdown checklist and shut down and secured the affected engine. We had already established communication with approach and [advised them of the situation]; but did not request any assistance as a normal landing in my judgement was assured. I knew we'd be overweight for landing (exceeding a limitation); but with the weather conditions elected not to have further assistance on the landing rollout.the landing was graceful and like normal. We taxied into the FBO without any trouble and we're pulled into the maintenance hangar where it was discovered that it was indeed a faulty sensor.from a human factors perspective; the hardest part was telling our private passengers that we needed to divert (being focused on the mission/not completing the mission which they were paying a lot of money for) along with the external pressures of responding to an emergency for part 135 on the ground and with company pushback (perceived possible pushback; job/career security) for our actions or inactions.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: C525B Captain reported diverting to an alternate after the left engine oil pressure sensor failed.

Narrative: During the last phase of our climb our left engine's oil PSI sensor became inoperative. The plane is new and has had some quirks in the past. The read-out was amber dashes. The oil temperatures did not indicate a loss of oil pressure. We were close to the top of our climb and I elected to continue to see if a reduction in N1 would trigger a fix (techniques like this have worked in this plane). On taxi and takeoff all engine instruments were green in the normal operating ranges with no engine; or other; messages.During the last phase of the climb I looked in the abnormal procedures checklist which didn't have this exact situation. It had only a checklist for amber colored digits. That checklist called for a reduction in power leading to a securing (shutdown) of the affected engine. It appeared that the sensor was at fault; but there was no way to know for sure. The corresponding circuit breaker was in the normal position. No attempt to reset it was made until on the ground which proved to not cause a difference. The oil temperatures between the affected and non-affected engines were within two degrees Celsius. However; I learned after the matter that at FL400 the oil temperature of the affected engine; if a loss of oil pressure had been the case; may not have risen because of the ambient atmospheric conditions at that altitude.After consulting with maintenance on the ground; via onboard Wi-Fi; we decided to divert to [a nearby airport]. The decision to divert came approximately 35 minutes into our flight or within 5 minutes of our cruise phase.The G3000 book describes the amber dashes as 'values outside the valid range.' Again; the engine operated like normal; but it could not be determined if it would stay that way which lead to our diversion.When we began our descent I pulled the affected engine to idle. As we got closer to [our diversion airport] we followed the engine precautionary shutdown checklist and shut down and secured the affected engine. We had already established communication with Approach and [advised them of the situation]; but did not request any assistance as a normal landing in my judgement was assured. I knew we'd be overweight for landing (exceeding a limitation); but with the weather conditions elected not to have further assistance on the landing rollout.The landing was graceful and like normal. We taxied into the FBO without any trouble and we're pulled into the maintenance hangar where it was discovered that it was indeed a faulty sensor.From a human factors perspective; the hardest part was telling our private passengers that we needed to divert (being focused on the mission/not completing the mission which they were paying a lot of money for) along with the external pressures of responding to an emergency for Part 135 on the ground and with company pushback (perceived possible pushback; job/career security) for our actions or inactions.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.