Help. Ford Lehman Dies at worst of times

[BuoyOBuoy]

Your polishing system should have a filter.
Since you mentioned by passing it, maybe a valve is in wrong position?

Reply to my Ford Lehman quitting to the worst of times.
Two coincidences on one trip.
After installing new filters and lift pump - which made no difference - I installed a new Racor filter. Appeared to solve the problem but not.
I will still getting very small amounts of air which of course would cause it to stall out.
Long story short. Mechanic found the problem.
One of the small metal clips that hold fuel lines together was loose and over 45 years had chafed one of the lines so that a pin hole was letting air in. Have no idea how long it was like that because the clip was blocking the pin hole until it got rough Then finally slipped out of place exposing the hole which couldn't be seen with the naked eye.
Who would have thought ? Purrs like a pussy cat now.

 

[slowgoesit]

Awesome! Thanks so much for following up on the solution with us.

 

[Lepke]

On another engine brand, I traced out a intermittent engine stopping. Cold, the engine would start fine, but soon die. Eventually found a tiny hole in a fuel line that was caused by vibration. It was rubbing inside a rubber coated bracket. The hole was so tiny it didn't leak with the engine on or off.
It was found by pressurizing the fuel line. Apparently very small amounts of air were drawn in. Eventually collecting in the fuel line and causing a break in the fuel supply.
One way of looking for tiny fuel leaks is wrap every connection and fuel line where it touches anything with toilet paper. Leave for some hours and a leak usually will show where none did w/o the paper. Another way is pressurize the fuel line and filters with compressed air and look & listen for leaks. A bicycle pump is enough pressure.

 

[Nick F]

Buoyobuoy - thanks for posting the final outcome.

Just to help me add this to my mental troubleshooting databank, can you tell us where exactly the leak was? Was it upstream or downstream of the fuel lift pump?

I can only imagine it must have been upstream, since the downstream tubing should always be under positive pressure with the engine running.

 

[BuoyOBuoy]

Right on. It was upstream and for a neophite like me, it would never been diagonsed.

 

[Delta Riverat]

Good news! Yeah, when diesels drop out almost always a fuel problem. Which is the good news.

The bad news is when they don't develop enough compression to ignite the fuel.