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The electric fuel pump is the only fuel pump on the car. The car is a 1984 Honda Accord sedan. The car’s been here in Southern California its whole life (as far as I know), and there is no rust present anywhere on the vehicle.
[quote=”nightflyr” post=171204]Can’t say if it is normal or not..
But I’ve never heard that from any type of fuel pump.
Might suggest a fuel pressure test and volume test if you have or can get the specs.If it were me though….
I’d replace it.[/quote]I have the specs in the service manual. Since it’s carbureted, it doesn’t need a lot of fuel pressure.
[quote=”nightflyr” post=171198]Are you 100% sure that noise is coming from the fuel tank?, or is it an external pump?
That sounds awfully distinct to be an in tank pump.And to your question:
Yes you can have a failing fuel pump, but still have it supplying fuel just not at the correct volume or pressure[/quote]Yeah I forgot to mention that – it’s an external pump, not in-tank. So fortunately it’s pretty easy to get to. What you’re seeing in the video is just the bracket that holds it in place.
I’m asking because internet searches have some people saying the noise is normal, and others saying it’s not and something is wrong.
I bought my used car with no A/C compressor in it, one of the previous owners had removed it long ago for whatever reason. Like the above poster said, just plug the lines.
Well I feared the worst, and got the worst. Received that fateful call from the mechanic this morning – the timing belt did indeed break. They don’t know the extent of the damage yet. They wanted my permission to proceed to put a new timing belt on and run compression tests. Makes me wonder how much of this would have been different if I had successfully pulled that upper timing cover off two weeks ago…
[quote=”cap269″ post=170888]Have you checked out (tested) the fuel pump relay? This part can also be called a main relay, circuit opening relay, or fuel (pump) cut-off relay, depending on who you talk to or which manual you’re reading.[/quote]
I did not test the main relay or fuel pump relays. I can’t right now, since the car is at the shop…
[quote=”Rob781″ post=170843]did you check the other spark plugs or did you just stop at #1??? because if you get spark at others but not just one the distribitor cap, coil, spark plug wire… because then you would have a very short list of things it can be… it could even be like a failing crank or cam sencor… that is acting up… but that is slim but a posiblity… basicly ramdimaly not fire
I would take the cap off and look at the wiprer and cap to see if they are going bad…. and pay close attantion to the middle contact area for dirt and burn in… so if you have hany dout if they are bad…. I would replace them caps and wipers are like $20 so not ot expresive… and have a noramal life of like 30k-40k… I think… but maybe someone else could say the average change time is[/quote]I didn’t check the other plugs, I thought one not having spark was enough. There are no crankshaft position or cam sensors on my car, that I know of at least. Someone mentioned an oxygen sensor, there is one on my car – a receipt from the previous owner shows that it was replaced in 2010. Distributor cap is only three weeks old. Also, what “wiper” are you referring to?
[quote=”Rob781″ post=170808]did you try spraying some starter fluid into the intake and see if that helped???
now I noticed that you check the pressure feul how was that…. also did you check the flow too with a gaudge…. because you can have pressure but not have a good flow… in some rare things like a clogged line or a broken line… you can have the pressure but not the flow,,, also I saw you where going to change your fuel pump but did you also replace your fuel filter?[/quote]
I did not try starter fluid, but I did hook up a spark tester to the #1 plug and cranked the engine (or at least tried) while waiting for the tow truck yesterday – didn’t see any spark. Not sure what that means yet. Mechanic told me this morning that if the no-spark has anything to do with the distributor, they won’t charge me a dime for diagnosis and repair – since they’re the ones who installed that distributor a couple of months back.Fuel pressure/bad fuel pump is possible, but I don’t think that would cause the strange cranking noise you hear in the video. I did replace both fuel filters a few days ago, and the car ran slightly better afterwards (until yesterday). Still praying that the timing belt didn’t break.
[quote=”Evil-i” post=170812]A bit out of left field, but I would look at the ignition switch and the wiring in the steering column. After 32 years of service, it wouldn’t be a surprise to find things are a bit worn and sloppy, causing an intermittent fault.
At this point, I’m inclined to put the 70F temp limit in the category of coincidence, at least for now.[/quote]
Ignition switch was replaced back in March. The 70F thing is still a mystery to me, but now I’ve got an even bigger problem.
Okay I finally got the car back home today. I talked to the mechanic for a while, and he explained how the fuel would just shut off, causing it to stall. He says the next step would be to test the fuel pressure, which I agree. I tried to coax him into telling what he thought the problem is likely to be, but he kept insisting on checking the fuel pressure next. He mentioned that it’s possible that there could be a short in the wiring to the fuel pump as well.
Anyway, the car handled an hour-long drive home in 110F heat pretty well, except for generally low power the whole way. My service manual was in the car, so now that I have it back, I’ve been combing through it all evening checking out exactly how the fuel delivery system in my car works. Fortunately, the fuel pump is not inside the gas tank, but next to it behind the rocker panel, held up by a bracket. The manual also extensively explains how and where to test for fuel pressure, and the what fuel pressure is supposed to be (16.7-21.6 kPa/2.4-3.1 psi). Tomorrow I might head down to AutoZone to rent a fuel pressure gauge from them. The manual says to hook it up to the fuel line just ahead of the fuel filter next to the carburetor. And on top of that, the manual also thoroughly explains how to test all related parts (fuel pump cut-off relay, sending unit) to see if they’re working properly.
He concluded that the spark is good, and the choke and carburetor are all working perfectly. I’m going to park the car in my garage and get back to you guys with results over the next few days.
Bumping this topic since it fell off to the second page rather quickly and I could use your feedback.
The mechanic at the carb shop called me yesterday and told me that he got the car to keep stalling on him while he tried to diagnose the problem, to see if it was choke-related. I don’t have much details at the moment, but he says the engine is stalling because of a “no fuel” condition. He told me that he wanted to further narrow down the source of the problem (clogged fuel filters, bad fuel pump, etc), but he would have to charge me $85-115 to do so. I don’t have that money right now so I told him I’ll just pick it up (I can’t get there until Tuesday).
In the mean time, is it worth purchasing a new fuel pump? All the ones on rockauto are electronic, and go for $20-30.
I’m going to drop the car off at the carb shop tomorrow, I spoke to the owner on the phone this afternoon. He wants me to leave the car overnight so that he can observe the stalling behavior himself and figure out what’s wrong. I’d be open to do that, but the shop is an hour away from my house and we have no (decent) public transportation….
Hyundai and Kia. Bad automatic transmissions, I hate driving them if I must. Horrendously ugly styling cues over the last few years as well. Plus the fact that everyone says that they’re up and coming, just makes me dislike them even more.
Thank you three for your responses. My carburetor is still under warranty, so I’ve called the shop and will bring the car in on Thursday.
Just in the last 24 hours, the car is running even rougher and there is noticeably worse fuel economy. I made a trip to the supermarket yesterday afternoon, and the car had very low power and sluggish acceleration. Apologies to the frustrated drivers behind me…anyway the bimetal thermostatic coil sounds plausible – maybe it burnt out. I was busy with work yesterday so I couldn’t get to checking out the fuel system, but I’ll take a look later today.