Unclogging fuel line

[Kyle Strong]

Okay, I drove my truck monday, no prob. Didn't go anywhere Tuesday, go to start truck in the morning today, nothing. It cranks, and cranks fast, but it seems like there's no spark. I checked the wire leading to the dist. cap, and it has power. I'm trying to avoid pulling a spark plug to check there, but if I absolutely need to I can. I have fuel too. What could cause it to not spark (I'm assuming that's the problem) if I've done nothing to it since the last time I drove it? Am I missing something?

 

[readymix]

First check to see if it has spark. If you don't know for sure then you only have one direction to go in.......check

 

[Kyle Strong]

I'm having a friend drop by in a few, so he can tell me if it has spark or not when I crank it over. I don't know why I wouldn't since I have power going to the distributor. Virtually everything's new in the dist. (less than 50 miles, if that) and I have new-ish (less than 200 miles) wires with brand new plugs. And I'm still trying to figure out what changed since monday...

 

[Kyle Strong]

okay, I apparently have NO fuel...did my pump take a crap all of a sudden? My inline fuel filter is dry.

 

[Kyle Strong]

Okay, I searched a little bit, but didn't get anything real valuable. How do you unclog a fuel line? It's the part of the line from the tank to the pump. I imagine that's my problem since when I pulled off said line from the pump no fuel came out, and I can see the filter is dry. Thanks.

 

[dyeager535]

You need to see if you can siphon fuel out of the tank.

Pretty unlikely the line just clogged up.

Get the siphon hose lower than the tank, (on the fuel line at the fuel pump) and suck on it a bit. Should be able to get gas going pretty easily.

Most likely is a dead fuel pump.

 

[Kyle Strong]

I'll try that. Can the fuel pump just up and quit like that? I mean no problems to speak of before, then all of a sudden not working? Well, I was having some fuel issues about a week ago, but I took it to a shop and they fixed the problems I had. Maybe the fuel pump was the problem all along?

 

[mo]

pry unlikely it's clogged, but i've unclogged one before with compressed air (detached the line of course)

 

[Kyle Strong]

Also a good idea. I might try that if it turns out to be the problem. So I'm assuming that fuel pumps can die randomly like this then?

 

[dyeager535]

I had a fuel pump die on me once. Driving to work, truck stalls and dies. Starts right back up and off I go. Truck sits for 8 hours or so, leave work, get about a block, fuel pump is completely dead.

It would be more odd that somehow your fuel line got clogged, since there is a fairly large in tank "sock" that is almost impossible to completely plug. Anything is *possible* though of course!

 

[Kyle Strong]

hm. Sounds good to me. A fuel pump seems easier to replace than unclogging a fuel line...