At 10:24 AM 7/23/03 -0700, Tim Holt wrote:
>I've noticed that my Midget seems to run rough when I get down to about
>1/4 a tank - like it's starved for gas. ....
I had this problem with my '74 Mustang when it was less than 5 years
old. It turned out to be a small amount of rust sediment clogging up the
pickup screen in the tank. The lower the fuel level the worse the
problem. Fresh fill of fuel would cure the problem completely, for a
while. Filling the tank probably washed off the screen as well as diluting
the mix of rust dust to fuel content. With time the problem got worse
until it was happening when the fuel level was just a couple gallons short
of full.
I was temporarily busy and couldn't get to fix it for a while, so I carried
slip joint pliers and a small hand sport ball bump in the car. Without
even shutting off the engine I could slip the inlet flex hose off the fuel
pump (engine mounted mechanical type), give it one quick pump of air to
push fuel back into the tank to clean the pickup screen, put the hose back
on, and be on my way in a about minute.
I finally did finally R&R the fuel tank and dump the small remaining fuel
content into a clean baking pan for inspection. After sloshing and rinsing
the tank a few times, all that came out with the fuel was less than one
half teaspoon of rust powder, but that was enough to cause the problem. I
never had any reoccurence of the problem after rinsing the tank, and put
another 50,000 miles on it to boot. I suspect the debris in the tank came
from some filling station underground tank when they were being pumped low
or dry during the fuel shortage of the late 70's.
Barney Gaylord
1958 MGA with an attitude (and 330,000 miles with never a clogged fuel line)
http://MGAguru.com
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