DeTomaso Mailing List: February 00, Message #35

Dave,
Having been through the same symptoms and come home twice on a rollback,
you may have the same problem.  There is a screen filter built into the
bottom of the fuel tank which gets clogged.  Low fuel volume is adequate,
then it will run out of fuel, suck some crap, sometimes collapse the
rubber fuel line.  If you're lucky, it recovers.

Search the archives for all the details/repair methods.
GPD4

On Tue, 1 Feb 2000 21:53:05 -0500 David and Marilyn Bell
<mdbell@flash.net> writes:
> Help! Help! Help! (more where those came from)
> 
> I've recently purchased '72 pre-L that has a perplexing problem. The 
> car 
> starts, idles, and runs fine at low rpm but after accelerating 
> through the 
> gears a couple of times it will falter and sometimes completely 
> stall out. 
>  While coasting down after it stalls I can usually keep the engine 
> running 
> by gently feathering the throttle.  Eventually, it will settle back 
> down to 
> an idle and be back to where it was before the acceleration run.  
> Fuel 
> pressure appears to be good through the whole episode (9 pounds via 
> fuel 
> line gauge) and the glass fuel filter is clean and full - even 
> though the 
> car feels like it has just run out of gas.  Mechanically, the engine 
> seems 
> to be in very good shape with excellent manifold vacuum and 
> compression. 
>  The sparkplugs are darker than coffee colored but not black and 
> seem to be 
> burning OK.   The electric choke is working properly and John 
> Taphorn and 
> Kirby Schrader both seem to think the jets are sized OK.  Both 
> accelerator
> pumps appear to work fine and fuel is not dribbling into the motor 
> from 
> stuck float bowls (float level at the sight plugs).  John and I 
> separated 
> the plug wires to check for crossfire and that didn't help.  No 
> smoke, 
> either black or white, is ever visible.  There is some sporadic 
> backfiring 
> when trying to recover from the stall but none otherwise.
> 
> The engine is set up with 750 Holley and complete MSD ignition 
> system (with 
> soft rev limiter), including fairly new MSD blue wires and a MSD 
> billet 
> distributor.  Yesterday I yanked the distributor cap and cleaned it 
> thoroughly inside and out with alcohol and gooped the plug wires on 
> both 
> ends with dielectric lub.  Didn't help.  I've switched out rev limit 
> plugs 
> with no change.  Also 2 days ago John Taphorn retorqued the intake 
> manifold 
> - just in case. Yep, didn't help.  I regapped the plugs from 0.050 
> to 0.035 
> to drop the air gap resistance but no good on that either.  Nothing 
> I've 
> done so far seem to have any effect.
> 
> Tomorrows project is to pull the carb and disassemble it to look for 
> 
> fur-balls or gunk or whatever.  Also, I have new MSD wires, cap and 
> rotor 
> ordered and on the way - but at this point I don't really think that 
> is the 
> problem.  Has anyone had any problems with MSD rev limiters cutting 
> in when 
> they aren't supposed to?  Can I disconnect the soft rev easily 
> without 
> impacting the ignition system?
> 
> I'm trying to get the car running well enough to drive to TWS this 
> weekend 
> but as it is I don't think it will make it.  I may have to take the 
> T-Bird 
> - ugh!
> 
> Any ideas anyone.  Please.
> 
> Dave Bell
> 
> 
> 

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