[TheSilverBuick]

Thanks!

Still running into fuel problems #%&*!!! I tried to leave town Thursday afternoon and it quit on me about 30 minutes out, but I found that if I pinched the return line to the gas tank the pressure would come back, so I put a clamp on it and started on my way again. It went as long as around 80 miles without a hiccup, but eventually hiccupped again and again and again. So I turned it around about 155 miles from home and went home, at which point it ran the whole 155 miles home without a hiccup, aarrrggghhh!

So I made and stuck a restrictor tube in the return line to keep some pressure in the surge tank, as after some discussions with some folks it sounded like my lift pump was possibly cavitating because it was designed to hold 22psi and it was running unrestricted.

My restrictor tube, a piece of 3/8 steel with a piece of barbed 1/4" fitting inside and the sides of the steel tube crushed to hold in place.



So test drive number two. It was worth driving down the CA for the day at this point, so I opted to go to Bonneville Salt Flats for a day drive. It's about 130-140 miles each way and was forecasted to be hot. Perfect testing conditions.

Made the whole trip there without an issue. Got to the end of the salt flats road, took a "victory" picture, had lunch at the Salt Flats Café, and started home, buuuut didn't even make it out of Wendover and the car stalled out on me. This time my pinching the line trick didn't work. So if it's a vapor lock issue, it vapor locked hard with the restrictor tube in place. It was around 100ºF out, so plenty warm.

So many recommendations to re-do the fuel system again and set the regulator after the fuel rail and run a return from the engine bay, but that is a lot of work and I'm not convinced that adding engine heat via the fuel rail will actually help this case. It should be getting lots of "cooling" air flow in it's current location. So I instead made a new surge tank, similar to the old one but taller for more heat sinking ability, put the regulator return line above the lift pump inlet so fuel returned will be pushed upwards back to the gas tank instead of downwards to the high pressure pump. Which should reduce re-circulation of "worked" fuel. And lastly I welded cooling fins to the backside of the surge tank that hang off the side of the panel and gas tank and should see lots of airflow.

Thursday afternoon I leave for the Car Craft Anti-Tour. It's supposed to be 111ºF in Las Vegas, so if I have a problem it should crop up no later than there. If I have a problem, I will turn around and head back home and get my Skylark for the event.

My premature victory picture. The smoke from the Washington wildfires has settled onto the salt flats making it hazy.