Originally posted by ck42:
Originally posted by Tony2005:
11-year old gas tank and you don't know what may have been stirred up in the tank when they did the repairs. Change the fuel filter.



Good point. Didn't think about that. Even if this isn't the problem, it's likely that a bunch of crap was loosened when they did that work.

Chris




I hear this a lot, and it has got to be the most null and void argument anyone has ever made. Well that, and when people say 'Its not good to let you gas tank get too low cause then you suck all the crap up off the bottom of the tank.'

1 - Anyone who thinks pulling a tank stirs up any crap in the tank MORE than REGULAR DRIVING is not thinking about whats happening to your car when your going down the road... The crap in the tank is stirred up like mad when your driving. End of story. This has nothing to do with the guys problem.
Change the fuel filter because its a good idea, but this is probably not going to solve your problem.
Almost sounds like you are sucking air from somewhere.

2 - The thing about sucking crap up off the bottom of the tank when its low... you must realize the sock on the pump assembly is smashed against the bottom of the tank, so you are sucking the crap up off the bottom of tank 100% of the time.
It's not good to run your tank extremely low because gas acts as a coolant for the pump, but not for any other reason. Well, except for the possibility of running out of gas...

I have the same problem with my 98 - shows a 1/4 tank but sometimes it acts like you run out of gas... a little whipping of the wheel side-to-side and we're good to go for another 60 miles.

A more logical explanation is the bottom of the tank isn't flat, It's very irregular with baffels and the pump sits in a little bowl-like-thingy, It's possible the design of the tank allows gas to get trapped in certain areas of the tank away from the pump under certain driving conditions. Also the sock has a metal ring that just pushes onto the bottom of the plastic pump, not the best seal in the world.

The combination of the possibility of gas temporarily getting trapped away from the pump, and the pump sucking air where the socks connects to it, seems like a much more plauseible cause givin the symptoms and the fact that 'sloshing' the gas side to side when you whip the wheel back and forth brings the car back to life.

On the other hand, the fuel level sensor is part of the pump assembly, so if it was able to read 1/4 tank you would think that the pump would be sufficiently submerged... The debate continues...

An off-the-wall possibilty... My car has the fuel return system, It's far fetched but possible that the angle of the gas returning to tank creates an air bubble stream that aims for the pump pickup... Hey, there has to be some reason the put 3 different fuel systems on the same car.

All that aside, if the fuel filter was the cause then you would have high rpm cut-out reguardless of the fuel level in the tank.

Maybe some electrical plug is only half-plugged in????