it is my understanding that the retaining clip holds the injector for easy install. into the manifold. and you could get by with out them, as they serve no purpose after install. is this true???????
p.s. i swaped injectors today and two of them had no clip. so i dont know if i need them or not thanks....

 

usually there is some space above where injector is when locked in clip in fuel rail.isit enough to cause leak or allow upward movement? dont know wouldnt want to find out.be safe and replace missing parts

 

Lots of people have used LT1 injectors, which are slightly shorter than TPI injectors, therefore have left out the clips, to seat the injector properly in the fuel rail. And have been fine without the clips. You yourself said 2 clips were missing on yours....Did yours ever leak, because of them not being there?

Honestly? I believe that it was more of a convenience issue for GM, to assemble the injectors into 1 rail as an assembly part, which made engine assembly easier. Pick up a rail with 8 injectors on it, set it on the engine.....Done (besides the bolts holding the rails down). Easier than having to insert 8 injectors & 8 clips, then set the assembly on the engine.

 

thanks no the didnt leak i found a hell of a wright up that indead said the clips were for assemble, the injectors would fall out from time to time on the assembly line, as they was on their way to the build. thanks again!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

The clips have nothing to do with assembly, there is no way the injectors would fall out. If you've ever put them in you'd know that. They fit too tight. If it was for assembly only and they fell out so easily, why would the injector not move under 45+PSI of pressure?

I would use them. One on the road mishap, work on the car, accidentally unseat an injector... and then you set it on fire. Does not sound like a wise way to do things.

 

Building ONE engine, yeah. No big deal assembling everything.

On a production line where the person putting fuel injectors & fuel rails on an engine? If the clips saved him even just 3 seconds per engine....Multiply that by dozens of engines he had to build every single day. It added up.

As for not moving under fuel pressure....The rails are BOLTED to the manifold. Injectors couldn't just "pop off". The bolted on fuel rail would have been in the way.

 

I'm just stating what the article said, "on the assembly line the rails where hung on some sort of moving conveyor with the injectors in stalled with no clips. The movement and shaking of the rail would ocasionally cause them to fall out." if they fell out they probally was not seated all the way i dont know.

 

I'd have to hear that right from the guy who required the clips to be put on them to believe that. The basis for the story does not make any sense, it sounds like conjured up journalism. I've had the rails off before, even shaking a set of fuel rails with no clips they do not fall out.

As far as this 3 second stuff, have you ever put those clips on? It would take way more than 3 seconds to install 8 clips on 8 injectors and then spin each clip once its in the rail. And I'm well aware the rails are bolted to the manifold, but the injectors are not bolted to the manifold. I have one sitting on a table right now that years ago I proved to someone you could easily unseat a stock RP injector from the rail with them bolted in place and no clips. So you can bolt them up all you want, it does not prevent the injectors from moving it will only prevent them from "falling out" of the rail if that was ever even a concern.

 

3 seconds was a # I just pulled out of the air. My way of saying....GM woulda been happy to have only saved 3 seconds...PER ENGINE. It doesn't matter if it is 3 or 3000 second savings. A savings is a savings. Keep in mind GM would do anything to save 1 single penny, per hundreds of thousands of TPI engines built. Added up, that amounts to a big savings. You were building ONE engine at a time, so even 15 min extra wouldn't have mattered to you.

The fuel rails & injectors hanging from a conveyor is the most logical explanation yet. Not as delicately handled as picking up the assembly with human hands.

 

I know you pulled it out of the air, but any assembly time savings would be more than completely wiped out by how long it would take to put those clips on the injectors, and how long it would take to spin them all to a locked position. Even with specific tools to do so. 3 seconds, 10 seconds, a minute, all less time than putting those clips into place.

Have any of you ever attempted to make the injectors just 'drop' out of the rails? With the new GM o-rings, they fit very tight. They're on an angle from vertical as well, making them even LESS likely to just fall out on their own. Also, my friend owned a very early 85 and it had the clips on them. So if it became a problem on the assembly line they would have had to find out and come up with a solution really really fast. I call BS on the fall out story. If they had anything to do with ease of assembly, it would be that you can easily get the injector moved out of place on the rails while installing the rails onto the base without the clips on them. I'm pretty sure its the #1 and #3 can be pushed in past the o-ring seat in the rail without the clips, nevermind that many of the rails allow the #8 to be moved out of the o-ring seat on the rail and still have space left before the injector hits the manifold.

 

if any of you are familiar with the bosch design lll fuel injector, there is no where on the injector that allows for a clip. It is the pressure from the fuel rail that holds them in place! An injector is not going to fall out while under 43.5psi! Obviously the only time you would have a problem ie....vacuum leaks, fuel leaks, is if the injector is too short, but even then they will not fall out.

 

Nobody ever said anything about injectors falling out after being installed on an engine. After all, the fuel rails are BOLTED to the lower intake manifold.

The falling out mentioned, was in regards to after the injectors were inserted into the rail, but before that assembly was bolted on to the manifold & while hanging from an automated conveyor. Easy to not jiggle the assembly when moving it by hand, but conveyors stop & start NOW. Now slowly start & stop, from position to position..

 

Just as an experiment, I put one of the spare (JUNK) Multecs I have in the spare rail I have, and RAILED on that rail on my workbench. It did not fall out. I left some pretty serious marks in the 4x4 piece of wood I was banging the fuel rail on.

This is a more likely reason to put the clips in, this is a stock 89 Multec in an 88 rail, notice where the o-ring is. I can see someone pressing the fuel rail into place on the line, and having the injector push up into the rail beyond the o-ring seat. Its also rather a PITA to get it back into place once its done this, as the rail is not tapered on the top half like it is on the bottom. Thats just a result of how the rails are machined, they cant taper the top side. It would also chance damaging the o-ring, so once this occured the rail would have to be removed, injector removed, replaced, and try again. The old injector would likely have the o-ring trashcanned in favor of a new one.

I wanted to add that I would have shown the injector being pushed down too far into the intake and unseated from the rail, but the Multecs have a different design on the bottom end and stop at about the point where the clip would line up on the rail. The older RP injectors and older Bosch/SVO (not type III) drop down more than these and can unseat depending on the machining of the parts. I dont have any of those laying around at the moment. The stock parts vary slightly from one to the next. Unlikely this will occur in use, but very possible during install without the clips or if someone works on the car and inadvertently moves it too far out of place.

 

Does anybody know which way the injectors are sitting on the intake on LS1 the right side and the left side are pointing different ways I took them out I wasn't paying attention you can turn them all the way around how do they fit in there correctly

 

Sorry to necro an old thread, but you DO need the clips. One of my injectors came unseated today, fuel everywhere, no fire thankfully. There was excess movement on the top end, and it came out from the fuel rail side. The fuel rail bolts were fully bolted down as far as they could go and it still happened. If it happened to me, it can happen to you! Spend the extra $10 for a set of clips!

 

which injectors are they? For the most part depending on which injectors you have you do not need the clips as the pressure from the fuel rail holds them in place...however if the are shorter than the stock injectors they will leak.