Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[ukdave2002]

Thought I share this as its an odd yet simple and cheap fault to fix!

In the last couple of weeks, my Z van developed a misfire, it would at worst kill the engine, a very unpredictable fault; the van could run for hours and then die or run for just a few mins and then stop.

The symptoms were that the van would be running fine and then suddenly die, it would sometimes restart and run fine, or refuse to start at all….. It had to be electrical; the wiring on the van is shocking; it’s completely wired in black pvc !, to be honest I suspected the Lucas PLC switch; I have seen a few of these recently breaking down. So I wired the coil and fuel pump directly to the battery….same problem swapped the coil…same problem. When the engine failed I whipped the cover of the float chamber and fuel was allways at the correct level.

So I attached a voltmeter to the common coil (SW) and fuel pump connection, as the engine died I noticed the voltage dropped, given that this is now wired directly to the battery and the coil had been changed I took closer look at the fuel pump, after removing the points the fault became clear; the insulation on the cables that go to the fuel pump coil had broken down, randomly earthing the live pump feed and of course coil.

To fix this fault, the pump coil needs to be removed from the casing, this requires the coil to be pressed or tapped out from the top; the 60 year old insulation can then be replaced

Van now runs fine

Dave

[buzzy bee]

Nice when you find a fault like that!

[kevin2306]

great fix, faults like that can be quite untraceable!

Kev

[Rick]

Good stuff do you drive the van around much?

RJ
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[ukdave2002]