Allright, a while ago when I swapped carbs on my car and stuff and we had to somehow reset or jump my fuel pump to get it to pump again. Well I had my engine down to the shortblock, and now that it's together again, I gotta reset the pump or whatever to get fuel pressure. I can't remember how to do this now. If aynone knows how please let me know.....

-Thanks, Brandon

 

Just crank it until it starts.

 

I got another problem now. I got the fuel pump working- I can hear it. Now however I'm not getting any fuel..... All the fuel was out of the line, as I had to repair it. Now I got the line together and the pump working, but according to my pressure gauge under the hood, there's no fuel, nor is there anygoing into the carb. Does it take a long time to get from the tank to the carb throgh the line? If so, how long should I crank for?

 

???

 

A few more details of your system are needed.

An in-tank electric pump was not factory standard equipment for a carb'd '86. Was this car originally TPI, V6, or was the in-tank electric added later?

Do you have a mechanical pump on the engine? If so, what type? Where are you measuring the pressure?

The electric pump should be self-priming. Are you sure there is gas in the tank? Have you taken off a line to see if you are getting any flow?

 

The engine is a SBC out of a '69 or '70 Camaro. I'm using the in-tank electric pump that was originally in the car, there is no mechanicla fuel pump. There's gas in the tank. I haven't taken the line off, but when I had it off a few days ago, gas was going through it. However, there is no gas going to the carb right now.

 

How are you controlling power to the fuel pump?

 

Electronically. I got it runnning now, but I'm not getting pressure, do I ahve to keep cranking?

 

What does "electronically" mean? Are you using the oil pressure switch? How and where are you measuring fuel pressure? How are you regulating pressure from the in-tank pump?

 

I'm measuring fuel pressure fromma gauge I have under the hood, it's the stock FI pump, so I have a Mallory regualtor off to the side in the engine bay.

 

we replaced a fuel pump in a blazer and had the same problem. Wasn't getting any fuel pressure up front though we could hear it. It had air trapped in the line. We ended up almost filling the tank up and and kept on cranking it. Becareful with the starter don't overheat it or you'll be replacing that too. just keep cranking and eventually the pump will purge the air. Try disconnecting the fuel line to the car or injector and crank until you get fuel.

 

Allright, I'll try disconnecting until I get fuel..... I'll let you guys know how that goes.

 

Allright, well I got fuel flowing and stuff, went to start it and it's all blowing back up through the carb. My guess is I installed the rotor 180* backwards, I'm going to check now.

 

Okay I got another question. We got my plug wires on right, the rotor is on the right way along with the cap, but it simply will not start. On occasion it blows something up through the top of the carb. I'm assuming it's fuel?

What could cause this, and why isn't it starting? Also, I went to check for spark, and I put the plug wire up to the header to see if the spark would jump, and it didn't. So I'm either getting no spark, the spark isn't jumping to header (are headers aluminum?) or the coating I recently did on my headers (black header paint) isn't allowing it to jump? What's the reason for the gas blwing back up through the carb?

 

 

take the distributor out, turn the rotor 180 degrees, drop distributor back in.

 

I already did that. Then we thought my wires were on incorrectly, so I flipped them around too. I'm 100% sure that my rotor is on correctly, does that mean my wires would be off? I'm gonna go switch them around and see what I get.

 

Just to make sure we've covered the basics:

Remove all of the spark plugs and make sure they are dry. You may have flooded the engine and wetted all the plugs.

Get the engine in the #1 firing position: With the #1 spark plug out, turn the engine over until the timing mark on the damper is approaching the timing tab and air is being pushed out of the #1 spark plug hole - if the timing mark is coming up and no air is coming out of the #1 spark plug hole, that's the #6 firing position. When you are sure #1 is the one being pressurized as the mark approaches the tap, bring the mark to the "zero" mark on the tab and stop.

Put the #1 spark plug wire on the distributor cap terminal that the rotor is now pointing to. Put the rest of the wires on in this order: 8-4-3-6-5-7-2 in the clockwise direction. The cylinder #'s are:
Driver's side ---- Passenger side
Front
1 ---------------------- 2
3 ---------------------- 4
5 ---------------------- 6
7 ---------------------- 8
Rear

And, just to be clear, the part about "cranking the engine until you get fuel to the carb" assumed you had a mechanical pump. Since you hadn't said what kind of fuel pump you had up to that point, it was a reasonable (although inaccurate) assumption that with a carb you had a mechanical pump. Now that we know you don't, disregard that advice.

Does your carb have an operating choke?

Has the fuel pressure regulator adjustment been backed out? If so, you may be returning all your flow to the tank, thereby not creating any pressure at the gage.

 

Well I have fuel now, but now I'm getting no spark. I just put a wire to the head, and no spark jumped. I've gotta go through the rest of my ignition system and find out what the problem is now.

 

check for voltage out of the coil then test the coil if the coil is good then I'd suspect an ignition module.

 

Well I followed all of the wires up to the coil and they were good (with a test light). I'm going to pull the distributor cap tomorrow and see what's up (coil in cap).

 

Allright, well I figured out it was thee ignition module that was bad. I bought a new one. My question is, my mechanical advance seems like it could use some grease or something on it. What would you reccomend to use. I have some graphite here, would that work?

 

I got it together now. The mechanical advance is fine and the module was just replaced. I tested the coil and that's good. It still won't start! Tomorrow I'm gonna pull the distributor again and make sure it's dropped in while cyl. #1 is on the compresion stroke.
(Edited by moderator to remove unacceptable language.)

 

make sure you have the wires going the right direction around the distributor. I fought for a week trying to get a car started and I failed to notice I was using the wrong rotation. I was using a ford counter clockwise rotation.

 

Actually for a while I did have it that way because the last engine I had worked on before that was a Frod striaght 6. However it is set-up to go clockwise now and my wires are set up: 18436572. That right, correct? All the wires, plugs, and the ignition module is brand new, so I know it's not those. It ain't the coil either.

 

Well I'm starting to think maybe I tested the coil wrong, because there is no spark whatsoever.

I pulled the plug wire off and held the plug wire with insulated pliers, and then put an extra spark plug terminal in the boot and put it about a sliver away from the power steering bracket. Is there anything else that could possibly go bad besides the coil or the module that would cause me to not get spark?

Also, I checked and the rotor is in the right position. All the wires going to the distributor were never touced while I had the engine apart and they worked fine before I did, so it's not those. Any other idea what it could be?

 

pickup coil maybe? I don't knowsince you replaced the ignition module and the coil tested good. Maybe you got a bad new module. The awesome thing about HEI is there's only so much it can be.

 

Not sure what you mean by pick-up coil. I don't know, but this problem is gonna drive me out of my mind. Not only am I not getting spark, but I'm no no longer getting fuel!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? I'm so fed up wiht this car right now. I could hear the fuel pump working before and it was pumping fuel, but now you can't hear it, and there's no fuel, and still no spark. I don't know what the hell it could be. I'm gonna try to fix the fuel pump again, but that may be on it's way out. As for the spark issue...... I have no idea.

 

I don't know if the oil pressure switch will affect spark or not, the pick up coil is in the base of the distributor. are you getting voltage to the coil when you crank the car?

 

I tested the coil off of the car and it was fine. The book gives 2 tests to perform with a ohm meter and tells you if both come out infinte then replace it. One came out infinte and one came out within specs, so I still used it. How do I test to see if I'm getting voltage to the coil when I crank the car?

 

take a multimeter. plug it into the voltage supply and ground the ground lead and have someone crank the car

 

Allright, stupid question probably, but by voltage supply do you mean battery??? Or the wires going up to it?

 

power to the coil from the wire

 

The part where it goes into the coiland there's 2 wires, a tach wire and battery wire? It's a coil-in-cap type sitributor.

 

yeah check voltage of the battery wire.

 

Allright, I'll try this tonight.

 

if you don't have voltage there I'd check the connections and fuses maybe and try running a jumper straight from the battery to see if it fires.

 

Oh yeah! So happy, I got spark now (not sure what I did, didn't have spark yesterday, went out to test today and it did. ) I got the fuel flowing again too.

The car is turning over now, but it's still sounding like it's not actually firing. I'm gonna look more into it tomorrow, too cold out there tonight.

 

it's good that yuo're making progress. You'll get it in time. If you can have someone turn your car over while you rotate the distributor clockwise and counter clockwise you maybe able to get it to fire.

 

it's good that yuo're making progress. You'll get it in time. If you can have someone turn your car over while you rotate the distributor clockwise and counter clockwise you maybe able to get it to fire.

 

Allright! It finally started! Thanks for the help everyone.