I have what I consider to be a strange problem..

Recently I removed the original engin from my '71 coupe and had it rebuilt. I left the fuel pump in the engine compartment and simply clamped the 's' hoses to prevent fuel leakage. BTW, the pump worked fine up to the engine removal. The pump sat in this location, undisturbed, for several months until I received the rebuilt motor.

Installed the motor and re-installed the fuel pump using the 'long bolt' process that I read about on the forum. I get to the point where I'm turning over the motor and I can't get it to fire... I can get something to happen when I dump some fuel in the card but it is not sustained.

I removed the fuel line from the carb and the bowl & filter were dry. I read the forum again and re-re-installed the pump again using the 'long bolt' technique. This time I'm fairly certain I got it right because I had to 'muscle' the pump into position a bit which inclined me to beleive that I got the plunger under the rod.

Turned it over again and with the same result.. all dry. I noticed that my 's' hoses did not have a natural look to them - they looked kinked right where I had the vice grips on them. So, I replaced the 'S' hoses and tried again. I let it turn over for more than 20 seconds and still dry.

Tonight I will re-re-re-install the pump just to make sure. Logic tells me that the next location to look at is the pump. Can a pump die even when not in use ?? Seems unlikely. Can there be another cause ?

Thanks in advance

 

A few months back another Forum Brother had the same problem. It turned out that he had no gas in the tank.

 

:o OOPS! That would do it!

 

Should have mentioned that I checked that.. I have gas in the tank. However, when I took off the 's' hoses I expected fuel to be spewing out of the supply line.. didn't happen. Is there an inline valve?

 

FYI, last week I replaced my fuel pump and when I removed the feed hose from the tank to the pump, fuel was RUSHING out of the hose. I had to pinch the hose off also.. Once I let it drain a bit and see if it would stop and it would not. I didn't even replace that hose because I had no way to stop the fuel from flowing through the hard line if I pulled the rubber hose I had pinched. I only had about a 1/4 of a tank of fuel so....

Maybe you are not getting fuel to the pump. Something to think about. You did put the short bolt back in the block releasing the fuel pump rod...?? I know its a stupid question but... you would be suprised who has forgotten that.

I would definetly put a new fuel pump on a new motor anyway. I used a Summit 80gph pump and did not reconnect the return line and the car runs great, no more high RPM roll over.

 

when i changed mine, i had same trouble. couldn't get engine to run w/o putting fuel in carb. was like pump lost "prime". never had this problem on any of my other cars. ended dumping fuel down line off carb, to fill pump. this seemed to solve problem. still can't believe it worked, but it did. may be worth a try, even though it sounds kinda silly

 

Sounds like something is stopping the fuel from reaching you pump as stated above.

However, at the risk of incriminating myself as an imbasil, I have pulled and reinstalled my motor twice now in the last 2 years for different reasons. And both times had a similar problem to what you are describing.

Everything seemed perfect but the darn thing just wouldn't fire. I could see gas coming from the carb when I gave it WOT with my hand, but the motor just wouldn't keep going.

Turns out My fuel lines feeding my pump were kinked just enough as to fill the bowls a little, so that they would squirt, but not enough to fill the bowls with the engine running, so it would die again, and again, and again....

Check and double check you rubber lines, this is easy. If that doesn't work, grab a compressor with an air spray nozzle on the hose, and see if you can't clear the hard lines to the tank by spraying into your 2 hard lines near the pump. If they are clear, you should have quite a bit of fuel flowing from at least 1 of these lines.

Sorry so long. Good luck.

Will

 

One more Idea, that I hope is not the case.

You said you had the motor rebuilt. Did you put a new cam shaft in it. I remember a couple of years ago, a buddy of mine rebuilt his motor, on a ford mind you, and he was running an electric pump, so he opted for a cam with not fuels pump lobe on it. There we were 2 months ago trying to get a mechanical pump to work , when the electric went out, and couldn't figure out why the pump wasn't pumping. Idiots.

So if you did replace the cam, are you sure it has the facilities for a mechanical fuel pump?

Again, good luck, and let us know what it turns out to be.

Will

 

What Ford motor was it? Most V8 Fords (289/302/351..352/390/427/428..., don't know about 429/460) have an eccentric that bolts to the front of the cam so no lobe to not be there.

I would make sure you installed a C3 "S" hose, not just fuel line. Fuel line will kink in those tight curves. You could remove the "S" hose from the pump and see if GENTLE air pressure puts any fuel out. Then you would know if it was a plumbing problem or a pumping problem.