GREAT BIT OF INFO, MUST READ!!!!

[dragrcr1005]

i work at a shop that specializes in commercial fleet vehicles. we recently had a 98 E350 powerstroke come in that had a weird problem. it would randomly loose power, start missing and eventually shut off completly. we pulled out hair out to find anything because we could not get it to act up. two days and 500 miles after the customer came and got the van it quit again and had to be towed to our shop. this time we had no choice but to drive the thing untill it acted up so we could get a better idea of what happens when it dies. i drove that van 100 miles untill it finnally started missing and bucking. after a scan, it had no codes, it buzzed fine and also had good contribution on all injectors. being that this is one of our larger clients we elected to pull all 8 injectors and have them tested. 4 came back bad from arundel fuel injection. the customer said to replace all 8 since the truck has over 200k miles on it and he planned to run it for a while longer. easy fix right, wrong. three days after and 600 miles later, again it dies and has to be towed. i started to check other things that might cause such a problem like fuel pressure. i found that the truck only had 10psi of fuel pressure from the electric pump. i pinched the return line and i had 60 psi. after checking i found the regulator on the fuel can to be bad. the o-ring had broke and was holding the regulator open. again, easy fix. i now had 60 psi of fuel pressure. the van sounded much stronger and had alot more power. i drove the van no more that two miles when it started bucking and loosing power. it seemed like it was out of fuel. i hooked up my fuel pressure gauge again and was still seeing 60 psi of pressure. i came home that night and was on the net trying to find any answer or possible thing to check to help me. i was running out of things to check. that is when i came across a thread that had the same problem listed in the title. it said that after replacing much of the same things i had replaced, he was told that there was a fuel filter in the tank. after he had checked, the guy was right. there are two small plastic screens in the tank sending unit that clogged on his truck. fixed his problem. i got to work, drove the van with a pressure gauge hooked up and saw that the reading would drop when hard on the gas to 0 psi. big problem. i pulled the tank and found the screens completly clogged, and the inner liner of the tank was coming apart and putting little paint shavings all over the place. after cleaning the tank and cleaning the screens the van had 60 psi at all times when driving and the van was fixed. i just thought i would spread the word. i have worked on these motors since they were put in fords in 94 and i had never heard about any kind of filter in the tank. i hope that this helps someone who is chasing a problem. my advice, any running issues, put a gauge on and drive it for a while. any pressure under 40 is not good and could cause detonation according to my information system at the shop(alldata). the power difference with the higher pressure is big!!!!

[pipelayerjdh]

Thanks for the share. Glad you got it figured out!

[nic2fast]

can you buy the screens seperate or do you have to buy the sending unit. ford told me that they didn't have any filter in the tank and the only one they had a listing for was the one on the motor. my better thinking told me that it had to have something to keep dirt out of the pump, but I didn't want to drop the tank for nothing.

[sikktruk01]

thanks for the headsup, may save someone a major headache in the future. makes ya wonder how it ever ran at all with all of those seperate problems. it's always fun trying to convince the customer they need that many repairs

[dragrcr1005]

Originally Posted by nic2fast

can you buy the screens seperate or do you have to buy the sending unit. ford told me that they didn't have any filter in the tank and the only one they had a listing for was the one on the motor. my better thinking told me that it had to have something to keep dirt out of the pump, but I didn't want to drop the tank for nothing.

the screens are re-usable. i am not sure about being able to get them seperate. i would think that they would be in with the sending unit if you purchased that. they are plastic, similar to the glass fuel filters that you might see on a older car.

[nic2fast]

if they are reusable then do you just clean them? and if so then how. My truck is a 99 with almost 300k on it. I'm sure they need some attention

[SCUFFY828]

Originally Posted by dragrcr1005

i work at a shop that specializes in commercial fleet vehicles. we recently had a 98 E350 powerstroke come in that had a weird problem. it would randomly loose power, start missing and eventually shut off completly. we pulled out hair out to find anything because we could not get it to act up. two days and 500 miles after the customer came and got the van it quit again and had to be towed to our shop. this time we had no choice but to drive the thing untill it acted up so we could get a better idea of what happens when it dies. i drove that van 100 miles untill it finnally started missing and bucking. after a scan, it had no codes, it buzzed fine and also had good contribution on all injectors. being that this is one of our larger clients we elected to pull all 8 injectors and have them tested. 4 came back bad from arundel fuel injection. the customer said to replace all 8 since the truck has over 200k miles on it and he planned to run it for a while longer. easy fix right, wrong. three days after and 600 miles later, again it dies and has to be towed. i started to check other things that might cause such a problem like fuel pressure. i found that the truck only had 10psi of fuel pressure from the electric pump. i pinched the return line and i had 60 psi. after checking i found the regulator on the fuel can to be bad. the o-ring had broke and was holding the regulator open. again, easy fix. i now had 60 psi of fuel pressure. the van sounded much stronger and had alot more power. i drove the van no more that two miles when it started bucking and loosing power. it seemed like it was out of fuel. i hooked up my fuel pressure gauge again and was still seeing 60 psi of pressure. i came home that night and was on the net trying to find any answer or possible thing to check to help me. i was running out of things to check. that is when i came across a thread that had the same problem listed in the title. it said that after replacing much of the same things i had replaced, he was told that there was a fuel filter in the tank. after he had checked, the guy was right. there are two small plastic screens in the tank sending unit that clogged on his truck. fixed his problem. i got to work, drove the van with a pressure gauge hooked up and saw that the reading would drop when hard on the gas to 0 psi. big problem. i pulled the tank and found the screens completly clogged, and the inner liner of the tank was coming apart and putting little paint shavings all over the place. after cleaning the tank and cleaning the screens the van had 60 psi at all times when driving and the van was fixed. i just thought i would spread the word. i have worked on these motors since they were put in fords in 94 and i had never heard about any kind of filter in the tank. i hope that this helps someone who is chasing a problem. my advice, any running issues, put a gauge on and drive it for a while. any pressure under 40 is not good and could cause detonation according to my information system at the shop(alldata). the power difference with the higher pressure is big!!!!

van chassis are notorious for that problem, been bit there before myself , there is usualy a little sock thing inside the tank that falls off the filter neck to that can clog it up also , glad you got it figured out

[dragrcr1005]

Originally Posted by nic2fast

if they are reusable then do you just clean them? and if so then how. My truck is a 99 with almost 300k on it. I'm sure they need some attention

i used spray brake cleaner. the junk gets stuck on the inside of the filter so spraying from the outside cleans it right up pretty easily. make sure you have a couple cans on hand.

[dragrcr1005]

bumpinnnnnnnnnn

[Mickirig1]

The ambulance company I work for replaced 6 tanks and blamed our fuel suppliers. You would think being the biggest ambulance company in the country they would have figured out the problem quickly.

chased a problem like this in a gas fueled truck. It ended up being the tank switcher. Only did it when it was over 75 degrees out.