Packard Forum Index » General

Hi all. Let me give a rundown of what I've done and what I'm experiencing and hopefully someone out there has the answer! Replaced/cleaned both fuel filters, rebuilt my electric fuel pump, plenty of pressure up to the carb. I start her up, she runs for about ten seconds and then sputters and stops running. If I pull the large brass plug on the top front of the carb where the fuel comes in, I see nothing inside. If I leave the car "ON" and crack the seal on the glass fuel filter, fuel starts coming in, and my car runs. I really don't want to have to do this every time I start her up. This is something that just started to happen recently. To me, it seems that my system is vapor locking right after the glass fuel filter on the front of the carb. Any ideas? Thanks,

Scott

If you remove the line at the carb and run the pump is there good sustained flow thru the filter or just a trickle?

It's a full on flow, no hesitation, no spurts. One of the reasons I'm going nuts! If I "bleed" it by loosening the screw on the bottom of the glass, she will stay running.

What happens if you remove the ceramic element from the filter?

Haven't tried that yet, I'll try tomorrow. I cleaned it out two days ago with carb cleaner (I've done this a couple of times in the last nine months), blew it out and then let it air before re-installing it.

Does this have the odd gasket with the four slots and a center hole? It does sound as though the ceramic filter is plugged?

I'm suspicious of the filter too but you said you had sustained good flow. I went thru similar just as you are where element was cleaned, I could blow air thru with no difficulty but when gas tried, it went down to a trickle and couldn't keep the carb full.

If you use solvent and compressed air to clean the ceramic element, don't forget to blow in the opposite direction to the fuel flow, otherwise you just embed the particulates further into the ceramic matrix, rather than removing them. Doing this (blowing in the direction of the fuel flow) will generally further restrict the flow, assuming dirt is present.

If you have access to one, an ultrasonic cleaner is a great choice.

Ultrasonic cleaner is a great idea. Wish I'd thought of it when going thru this. Harbor Freight has a few reasonably priced but not sure what the tank is made of. O_D, any suggestions on what the best liquid would be--plain water??http://www.harborfreight.com/catalogsearch/result/?category=&q=ultrasonic

HH, on the chance that gums or varnishes or other organic residues might have coated the ceramic and acted as a glue to attract and hold particulates I'd probably pick lacquer thinner or brake-clean to remove the gum and any co-adhered particulates at the same time. As for just particulates trapped in the matrix, they are probably not solvent-soluble, and perhaps not even water-soluble so I don't think the choice of solvent is particularly important. If the ultrasonic tank was metal, I'd probably do it in a single step with the solvents mentioned above.