What have you done to your DeLorean today?
Well, I finally had the dreaded Orange fuel line failure. I had just left my house this morning headed to the annual Delorean gathering at Deer lake orchard in Buffalo MN. I got 1 mile down the road and the engine shut down. I rolled into a driveway and tried restarting the engine. It fired up on CSV fuel then died. It did that on 3 consecutive attempts. I open the door and get a strong fuel smell. I turn the key to the run position so that the RPM relay primes one second. I look under the car and sure enough fuel is pouring off the frame. I had some tools with me and was able to pull the access panel to observe where the fuel was coming from. Sure enough it was spray out of a crack in the OE style fuel pump cover. I pulled the cover off and found the hose had separated at the banjo fitting.
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I managed to clean the barbed fitting and cut the hose back enough to get a clean end. I pushed it back on enough so that I was able to fire it up and drive back home. I went to O’reilly auto parts and picked up some 1/4” Gates Barricade fuel injection hose and clamps. I changed out the old Orange hose. Everything seemed good. So we head out again on our 4 hr trip. However, we didn’t make it 10 miles and the engine intermittently shut down. It started back up and seemed okay, so I headed down the road about a mile to a location I could pull off and do some further investigation and check the usual electrical connections. (Ballast, ECU) The wiggle test didn’t seem to find any ignition faults while the car was idling. I decided to risk it and press on down the road. However, I only made it 2 miles before the engine shutdown again. I tried restarting again and It would fire up with CSV fuel then die. It did that a few times. I pulled the FP access cover. There was no signs of fuel leaking. I wiggled the leads and connector for the fuel pump. I turned the key again too here if the pump would prime, it did. I cranked the engine and it fired right up. I made the decision to abort the the trip and headed back home , fingers crossed. I made it back the 10 miles without issue. But since I wasn’t able to find the definitive cause of failure I opted to cancel the trip. I’ve got some further investigating to do.
The only thing I can think of is that I caused a disturbance in the wires to the pump when replacing the hose or by shear coincidence, I have a failing fuel pump. The pump did not sound any different than it’s normal hum. I guess I’ll need to jumper the RPM relay and see if the pump stops while I do more wiggle tests.
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