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Posted by George [174.124.172.196] on Saturday, August 25, 2012 at 07:19:50 :
In Reply to: vapor lock or ??? posted by junkyardog [71.181.3.220] on Friday, August 24, 2012 at 19:03:35 :
With the stock fuel pump, you can get vapor lock when it is hot. What happens is that the fuel in the pump starts to vaporize, even boil, essentially turning the liquid fuel into a gas. The pump will not pump a vapor or gas, only a liquid. gasoline.
This is most likely to happen when the weather and engine are hot and usually only occurs when the engine is turned off. Then there is no liquid flowing through the pump and what liquid gas there is in the pump has time to get much hotter and to boil or otherwise vaporize.
Our flathead engines are more prone to this problem, in part because the pump is close to exhaust manifold. It does not happen with electric fuel pumps located close to the tank.
To avoid this problem, make sure your engine has the little heat shield that came on cars of that vintage, repros still available. Also, open your hood to let thing cool off when you shut your engine off. Finially in necessary, carefully squirt a little water on the fuel pump before you try and start it. This will cool the pump enough to let the vapor condense back to liquid.