Engine running crummy

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So son of a bitch! I took my car out for a 20 mile ride to burn up some gas I had in there since last year. It was running pretty good, but had a bit of a hesitation at takeoff. Figured it was just the old gas, so I got down to a 1/4 tank and filled it up. I take off from the gas station to head back home and right when I get to my street it starts running like crap. I just got it home and back in the garage and shut it off. It was really running ruff and it pretty much just died as I turned it off. Lucky I was close to home.

Tried to start it but it only sputtered a bit. I think I may have just got a full tank of bad gas?  Son of a bitch!

 
John, Sorry to hear you have new problems, I thought you were in the clear. I had a similar problem last year. I had to drain the tank, blow out the lines and clean the carb in an ultrasonic tank. The real problem is how to get rid of 15-20 gallon of bad gas. I hope you get it sorted with minimal drama. Chuck

 
Well, not so sure I got bad gas now. I just noticed that the front sight glass of carb is full to the top with gas. I know I had the float level set correct. I just checked it the other day before I took it for a test drive.

So it’s like all of sudden right after I got gas the float got stuck? Or does that mean something else, like my fuel pump is bad?

I was going to pull the front bowl off, but the intake was still kinda hot. That can wait till tomorrow, but any idea’s about what’s going on?

 
Could be a piece of something is in the needle and seat or build up of crud in the bore of the needle and seat (had that one happen a couple of years ago). Off chance that float could be bad. Let us know what you find. Chuck

 
Could be a piece of something is in the needle and seat or build up of crud in the bore of the needle and seat (had that one happen a couple of years ago). Off chance that float could be bad. Let us know what you find. Chuck
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That’s what I kinda think too Chuck. First time I filled the tank since last September. The float should be good, this happened all of a sudden after I filled up the tank. I didn’t get any fuel stabilizer in last year before I had the lifter issues, so hopefully it’s just gunked up a little from that.

It seemed like it was running a little better when I was pulling out of the gas station. It stared right up and when I pulled out on the street it didn’t have the slight hesitation that it did. 

Anyway I will pull the bowl off today and see what’s up.

 
IF you can, get a bottle of Sea Foam fuel conditioner. Add some to the tank and run some through the carb. It's wonderful stuff. 

If you remember, bad gas is what I though my problems were last year and turned out to be a bad distributor cap. Not saying you have that problem as it was checked if I recall. I think you have a gum or dirt issue with the car. What carb is it?

Pain in the ass eh!

 
IF you can, get a bottle of Sea Foam fuel conditioner. Add some to the tank and run some through the carb. It's wonderful stuff. 

If you remember, bad gas is what I though my problems were last year and turned out to be a bad distributor cap. Not saying you have that problem as it was checked if I recall. I think you have a gum or dirt issue with the car. What carb is it?

Pain in the ass eh!
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Ya pita for sure! Going out to check it now.

 
Well I pulled the front bowl off and nothing is in there. Clean as a whistle and the needle is moving freely. The float went right down as I was draining the bowl. Everything looks good, I blew it all out and the metering block too. I put all back together and the same damn thing, but now it doesn’t really want to start. The front bowl is full to the top again, with the float all the way up too. The rear bowl is good, fuel in the middle of the site glass.

So what do you think is going on here? For some reason the front bowl is getting flooded, and I don’t know what is causing this. I have a stock mechanical fuel pump. I always thought if they go bad you don’t get fuel, not too much like I seem to be getting.

I did fill the tank to the very top, so could this be a vent issue? I’m baffled.

Any help would surely be appreciated! Thanks

 
Unscrew the needle and seat assembly out the top of the bowl. Sometimes a little piece of junk will get stuck in there and cause the needle to not seal. I like to use the OE Ford dual inlet front bowls for this reason. You get a big honkin screen filter to catch all the garbage when the ethanol starts tearing up your rubber fuel lines. Blow your fuel lines out as well. Blow them into a towel or filter, you'd be surprised what's hiding in there.

 
Unscrew the needle and seat assembly out the top of the bowl. Sometimes a little piece of junk will get stuck in there and cause the needle to not seal. I like to use the OE Ford dual inlet front bowls for this reason. You get a big honkin screen filter to catch all the garbage when the ethanol starts tearing up your rubber fuel lines. Blow your fuel lines out as well. Blow them into a towel or filter, you'd be surprised what's hiding in there.
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I took the seat assembly out, sprayed it down with carb cleaner and blew it dry then put back in. Started it up and it was running, but not that great, too much fuel again. Everything did look very clean again, so I figured I may as well adjust the float way down than it was. I finally got the gas in the site window down a bit. I lowered it down quite a bit and I finally got it at the half mark. Now it’s running way better again.

 I sure don’t know what happened, I never had to adjust the floats since I was having problems. The adjuster was really tight before I took it out to clean it. Jeez I feel like an idiot, but at least its running again, still need to drive it though. Thanks

 
Unscrew the needle and seat assembly out the top of the bowl. Sometimes a little piece of junk will get stuck in there and cause the needle to not seal. I like to use the OE Ford dual inlet front bowls for this reason. You get a big honkin screen filter to catch all the garbage when the ethanol starts tearing up your rubber fuel lines. Blow your fuel lines out as well. Blow them into a towel or filter, you'd be surprised what's hiding in there.
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I took the seat assembly out, sprayed it down with carb cleaner and blew it dry then put back in. Started it up and it was running, but not that great, too much fuel again. Everything did look very clean again, so I figured I may as well adjust the float way down than it was. I finally got the gas in the site window down a bit. I lowered it down quite a bit and I finally got it at the half mark. Now it’s running way better again.

 I sure don’t know what happened, I never had to adjust the floats since I was having problems. The adjuster was really tight before I took it out to clean it. Jeez I feel like an idiot, but at least its running again, still need to drive it though. Thanks
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John, just to throw this one at you, did you check to see if the float is "sinking" i.e. has a hole in it. Can you drop another float in it?

 
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I've seen this on my Cougar carb. All looked fine but, NOT. Check to see that the tension spring and pivot pin on the float is free and properly located. In the end I replaced the needle and seat, even though I saw nothing wrong. It fixed the problem. I then disassembled the carb and cleaned it in an ultra-sonic clean in an attempt to rid the carb of any mystery gunk. Keep us posted. Chuck

 
I've seen this on my Cougar carb. All looked fine but, NOT. Check to see that the tension spring and pivot pin on the float is free and properly located. In the end I replaced the needle and seat, even though I saw nothing wrong. It fixed the problem. I then disassembled the carb and cleaned it in an ultra-sonic clean in an attempt to rid the carb of any mystery gunk. Keep us posted. Chuck
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I did check that the float was moving freely. Everything seems in place. But I did notice that the float could go all the way up to the top of the bowl. So it just looked like there was no way for the needle to close. I did remove the float and it and the spring looks fine. So I lowered the float quite a bit before I put the bowl back on. At least it looked like the needle could close now. It was definitely better and the engine started up. Now I could see the gas level was lower than before. After a few more adjustments I got it in the middle and it was running pretty good. 

 I will take it for a test drive tomorrow if I can. I am also going to order a new needle and seat just incase. I don’t know what happened, it was so far out of adjustment I can’t believe it ran as  good as it did for the 20-25 miles I drove it before it started running bad. 

So I will let you know how it drives in the next day or so. Thanks again!

 
Dude, you have been on quite the roller coaster over the last year!

It sounds like your needle and seat adjustment somehow got out of whack. If the float could move all the way up to the roof of the bowl then the the needle&seat was threaded out of the bowl too far to close. Someone once told me that a good starting point was to hold the bowl upside down and thread the needle&seat in until the top of the float is parallel with the roof of the bowl. That should get you in the ballpark...

Looks like you may have to wait until tomorrow for another test drive its supposed to rain and storm today...

-Matt

 
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Dude, you have been on quite the roller coaster over the last year!

It sounds like your needle and seat adjustment somehow got out of whack. If the float could move all the way up to the roof of the bowl then the the needle&seat was threaded out of the bowl too far to close. Someone once told me that a good starting point was to hold the bowl upside down and thread the needle&seat in until the top of the float is parallel with the roof of the bowl. That should get you in the ballpark...

Looks like you may have to wait until tomorrow for another test drive its supposed to rain and storm today...

-Matt
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Ya Matt, it’s like every time I get one thing fixed something else screws up. I still can’t believe how far up that float was set, it was way out of wack. When I re adjusted the float with the bowl off I was above where you said a good starting point would be. So ya, that would definitely get you in the ballpark. I think I have it figured out...for now, lol

Hoping it doesn’t rain to much this morning and it clears up, but if not I will have to wait till tomorrow. So I just looked outside and it’s pouring! Looks like it’s going to be tomorrow till I can test drive it, oh well.

 

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