So if you have been around and seen some of my previous posts, you may have seen me griping about fuel floats getting hung. Ive had this happen exactly 4 times. This is due to the previous owner letting it sit for over a year after back surgery. He had it serviced and and the tank and carbs cleaned.. but every so often i manage to still get some small pices of crud from the tank. Just happens to be small enough to bypass the strainer but block open the needle. So the last time, at my wits end, i finally put a fuel filter on it. And now my worst fear about the filter has come true, its TOO restrictive.
Ive tried two types of inline filters (stone and paper). The stone one seemed to work ok for a week or so, didnt notice any trouble until one day after several hard acceleration take offs, and generally romping on it a bit, it started coughing. Back out of the trottle for a while, it caught up and ran fine. My guess, pulling fuel from the bowls faster than it was flowing in. So my second shot was to try a paper filter, which i thought would flow better. It too seemed to work ok for a while, but that ended over the past few days. It has been acting weird sometimes lately. A couple times on the highway it choked up on me and then i slowed down and it got better, trying to warm it up in the garage on the side stand it started caughing, sit it upright and it got ok.
To get the filter under the tank there has to be a slight maze of fuel line (this causes the side stand issue i believe). Here is what im thinking is happening. THe fuel pressure is a direct result of gravity and hight of fuel in the tank. Pressure is rho*g*h (density times gravity times height). All my problems are when the tank gets low, around 80+ miles on the tank. THe height of the fuel is too low and the pressure is simply not enough to push through the filter and my maze of fuel line. So tonight while heading to campus, at 110 miles on the tank (a record latley) i had to switch to reserve, but it didnt stop stuttering. I managed to get to the parking lot and left it on reserve (on side stand) hoping some fuel in the lines would flow down into the bowls while i was studing so i could get to the gas station later. Got outside and tired to start it.. it wouldnt run, only on full choke, and any throttle opening killed it. So i pushed it in the dark 1/2 mile down the sidewalk to the gas station. Filled it up to the brim, started, coughed a bit and settled into a steady idle.. grrr
So im either going to have to take the filter off or run some kind of electric pump. Im taking the bike to Arkansas in two weeks and cant be fighting fuel starvation problems, and i need use of my reserve tank.
Do you think i can get away with using an electric fuel pump. Im only worried about the pressure being to high and sinking the floats. I found a small 12v pump that supplies 1.5-3.5 psi.. would this be too much??
(some of this is from my post from MaxZuke)
Topic: can i run an electric fuel pump? (Read 6752 times)