I have a fuel problem I can’t solve. Here is how it occurred.
Driving car and it shuts down on highway. Won’t start back up but engine will crank. So towed it to my shop.
Check air flow is good, checked spark is good, checked fuel pump fuse, relay and signal to pump is good.
Sprayed starter fluid and engine runs for a few seconds. So I think fuel pump.
Purchased and replaced fuel pump. Car starts and runs. Drove down the road for a test, stored it at garage for couple days. Drove it home without issue later in the week. Few days later drove to Walmart, came out and car won’t start again. Same symptoms.
Towed to garage and checked all above is good again.
Checked injector signal with noid light is good.
Disconnected fuel line just before the fuel rails and cranked car, fuel does come out but not as high pressure as I would thought. So I think I need more pressure.
Don’t have equipment to check pressure though.
pulled fuel line off top of pump assemble to the cars fuel line, cranked car and fuel come out with what I would say is good pressure, put flexible fuel line back on. Car started up and ran. I could feel the fuel, or the pump vibrating, though the fuel line too. Shut it down and let it sit for 20 minutes and it won’t start again.
Pull flexible fuel line again but won’t start again.
Pulled fuel pump assembly, torn it all down and put back original pump. I had tested original was working just by sending 12 volts to it.
After reassembly of all parts, car starts, drove it around town and home. Shut it off and restarted it, didn’t let it sit though.
I just don’t trust driving his car to the city for work without a smoking gun problem corrected at this time.
Could a pressure regulator get stuck open and not allow high pressure at the rails, then messing with it, it closes?
any ideas? Thanks.

 

Do you have access to an oscilloscope?
I can see how following the method of troubleshooting led to suspect fuel pump
but, would check again when it won't start with the starter fluid
Have seen when it was intermittent like this and it turned out to be the connector to the coil and a crack coil housing.
So maybe watching crank, no start on the oscilloscope would give hints if the coil is bad??
Or watch the fuel pump power to see if it ever shuts off?? Relay??
I am just guessing

 

You narrowed it down to a fuel pump problem, but did not go all the way.
Many fuel good fuel pumps get replaced when there is only a poor connection for the pump. Good diagnostics requires that power and ground are available to the pump.
In the process of replacing the pump assy. the connections are moved around and a temporary fix happens, but the original problem is waiting to come up again Good idea to check AND confirm the power supply AND ground connections are good and clean.

 

So far the car is running fine. Only been driving a couple times on short runs though. Crossing fingers that it don’t crap out now. In fact the car has been starting better then it did before as well. Before, even after the new pump, the car would take like 20 seconds of cranking or multiple cranks to start. Seemed to do that for years. When I worked on it last, I put the original pump back in and while doing that I gave several taps, I hit it with the handle of a screw driver, to the pressure regulator. If it keeps running well I’ll replace that part I guess.

 

The gremlins are just waiting for you to get 100 miles away from home, ya know.