<VV> Re: VirtualVairs Digest, Vol 25, Issue 30

[Frank DuVal]

Here it is in a nutshell:

Electric fuel pump installers do it for one or more of the following 
reasons:

1. They want to modify the car just to do something to the car.

2. They are trying to trouble shoot a problem related to fuel flow.

3. They have excess money and time and are looking for a way to spend it.

4. They had a run of bad mechanical pumps and have had it! This did 
happen in the 80's.

5. They think that if a system is 40 years old it must not work anymore 
and new technology must be the answer. Of course electric pumps have 
been around over 50 years!

6. The car sits for long periods and needs a prime to fill the float 
bowls for easy starting.


People keeping mechanical pumps on the engines do so for one or more of 
the following:

1. It's working, why screw with it?

2. A new mechanical is only $10 more than an electric pump (pump only, 
also need wire, fuse, switch, etc).

3. Mechanical takes maybe 10 minutes to R&I?

4. Looks stock. Oh that's right, it is!


I have had cars on both sides of this controversy. The only Corvair I 
currently have on the road is running a mechanical pump just fine. I did 
install electric pumps on three of my daily drivers back in the 80's 
when we had a lot of vapor lock problems. But the fourth one ran great 
on a mechnaical!  So maybe new mechanicals would have fixed the problem. 
But this was also when the available stock of  mechanical pumps was 
rotten. Of course to correct vapor lock, the pump has to be mounted at 
the tank, where the fuel is cool. If the electric is mounted in the 
engine compartment, it can almost be as hot as the stock pump. And if 
you mount it higher than the stock location, suction fuel pressure is 
less, so the fuel boils easier!

Frank DuVal


richard white wrote:

>Can't understand the controversy about electric versus
>mechanical fuel pumps. Both can fail.
>As for fire less than 1% of accidents involve fires,
>although engine fires are more frequent do to
>pressurized fuel systems. Possibly due to degraddation
>of seals by gas additives such as ethanol. At any rate
>fuel fires are also possible with mechanical fuel
>pumps.
>To me electric fuel pumps are just another upgrade to
>a 40 year old car.
>Rich
>--- virtualvairs-request at corvair.org wrote:
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