Captain Obvious

You hear stories and reports of water in the gas, but it's always anecdotal. Here it is for real and with pics! I wonder if you'd get a straight answer from the fuel station guys. Seems they'd be opening themselves to some sort of liability claim if they told you about other complaints. I know condensation can be an issue, but sheesh... I'd be surprised to find that you could collect that much over such a short period of time. If it turns out to be simply condensation, then the fuel in mine is suspect right now! Here's to hoping you get some closure!!

Yeah, really. That's a lot of water! How did that happen?

I'm gonna go a little bit further with the engineer stuff and ask... Are you guys really sure that it's a BSPT at all? Have you checked yourself? Does anyone have corroboration from anyone who has actually checked? Does someone have a spec drawing for the oil pressure sender? Are we really really sure that it's a British spec in the first place? I've heard this BSPT thing here a whole bunch for the plumbing fittings, but personally... I'm skeptical. Haha!! Clear your conscious? Sounds like you had one too many?

Flare style check valve not your thing? Here's a banjo style alternative I've worked through. This one uses a 12mm banjo style outlet. Bosch part number 1 587 010 536 Bosch part number 1 587 010 537 And along with either of the above, you'll also need a 12mm x 1.5 sealing cap nut: Bosch part number 2 915 142 018 or Mercedes part number 1239900053 Here's a pic with the original valve up top and banjo style on bottom. Again, notice that the alternate is too long on the fuel pump inlet side: Give the pump inlet end the same cut off treatment: Again the trick is the different style outlet end. For this one, grab a 12mm banjo style hose off a junker. I grabbed one off a Honda Civic since just about half the cars at my local yard are Civics. Here's the pump with the check valve installed and the Civic fuel hose laying next to it: Cut the banjo fuel hose off at the appropriate length: And put it in place. There might be other hoses that fit more natural than the Civic, but it failing other options, the Civic hose works. If you find something better, please post it up: The other trick with the banjo style is that you have to cap the end of the valve. Bosch uses 12mm x 1.50 threads, so buy an appropriate cap (or find one on a Mercedes in the junkyard). Unfortunately Honda uses a 12mm x 1.25 threaded cap so the Honda caps won't work: Here's the parts you'll need for the banjo alternative:

Haha! No, I guess not. Although, it makes the "I'm too far away" card just a little more valuable...

Chas, I got the O-rings and the install went fine. I'm kinda flitting around between eight different projects and it slipped my mind. I was also thinking that I wouldn't post much about it until I had put fuel back into the pump and made sure that everything worked as intended with no leaks and such. So at this time, the O-rings are in, but untested. I know... What could possibly go wrong. go wrong. go wrong.

If I weren't so far away, I'd be happy to come over and strip with you guys. Wait a minute... We are talking about a car, right?

I already know the results... It works great. I actually put it on my car for the first time near the end of last summer, but was in too much of a hurry to take pics then. I knew I would be back in there again this off-season, so I saved the formal documentation until now. So if you're waiting for testimonials about performance, then I've got that too. On edit - About the pressure bleed... Even with the new valve my fuel pressure bleeds off in a couple hours as well, but it's not the check valve. Mine is either the fuel pressure regulator or an injector. Small enough bleed that I've still got fuel pressure even after I've crested the heat soak of a hot start, so I'm not too worried about it. It's lower priority now.

Gotcha covered: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/fuel-injection-s30/51862-fuel-pump-check-valve-alternatives.html

The original Bosch fuel pump check valve is NLA and I've been messing around with alternatives. The original check valve has a 10mm x 1.0 threaded inlet and a barbed outlet to accept an 8mm hose. Can't get it anymore... There are other Bosch check valves available with a 10mm x 1.0 threaded inlet, but the outlet styles are different. Not a problem! Here's the first alternative I've worked through. This one uses a 14mm thread taper seat style outlet. Bosch part number 1 587 010 539 Here's a pic of the stock check valve on top and the 539 on the bottom. Note that the pump end threaded portion of the alternate is longer than the original valve. It is so long, in fact, that it will hit the armature inside the fuel pump if inserted all the way: First, you have to deal with the longer threaded portion before you can screw the valve into the pump. If you don't you'll mess up the insides of your pump. I cut off a couple threads to shorten it. I used my lathe (because I have one), but you could just as easily use a hacksaw or file. Just make sure you pack the hole with some paper towel or something so you don't get metal chips inside the valve. If you can't deal with making it shorter, then you could just stack up a couple extra copper washers to take up the difference. Here's a shot of the valve after I shortened the pump end threaded portion: Now about the outlet end. Here's a shot where you can see the tapered seat on the outlet end: How do we deal with the outlet end? Easy... Just grab a fuel rail hose off a junked Audi. I didn't get the year or style, but they were easy to come by. I think a couple Audi models (and maybe even VW) used the same hose. Here's the alternative valve installed in the pump and the Audi fuel hose laying next to the pump: You can get the hoses with the end attached with a clamp, or permanently crimped on like I did. Here's the conical seat on the fuel hose that mates with the check valve: Here's another shot showing the printing on the side of the hose. Attach the hose to the valve and then loop the hose around and clamp it to the inlet of the dampener. Done. Cheap and still available. And easier to change in the future if necessary in the event that it goes bad: Only other complication was that the original hold down clamp for the original steel loop was too small to fit the Audi rubber hose through. I just used an appropriately sized cable clamp instead. When I get another chance, I'll talk some about a banjo style as an alternative. I got one of those as well.

And if you can't get that bump stop firmly against the back side of the lock nut, no big deal... It will be pushed into place the first time you steer to lock. The end of the rack will push it outboard.

Probably too late, but I wouldn't bother with that check valve from ebay. I bought one and it didn't last. Worked fine new when cold, but as soon as the engine compartment got hot, the hot fuel attacked the sealing disk inside the valve and potato chipped it. Didn't hold pressure after that. I've got pics of some of my alternate fuel check valve installs on the camera, but it's gonna take me a little bit to get them to the web and write something up.

Haha! I was hoping I wasn't the only other one to get that!

Timsz, Yup... That part without threads is an end of travel bump stop. So the order you've got the parts assembled in your pic is correct. Tighten up the end rod until it stops turning and is bottomed out on the end of the rack gear and then snug up the lock nut to keep it there. Then slide the bump stop(s) outboard until they are up against the inboard sides of the lock nuts. So when you bottom out the end rod, does it sustain it's own weight, or is it floppy hanging even when fully tightened? Funny that they never mentioned or pictured the bump stops in any of the manuals...

That's why I was asking if it was threaded. I was thinking the same thing. My 77 280 has bump stops that aren't described in the manual either.

Haha! You've taken your first step towards recovery.

Haha, yeah, I'm lurking. Visions of spindle pin bushings dancing in my head. I tried the forever priming as well, and it didn't help me much, but my (first order) problem was a non-existent check valve back at the pump. So I could have great fuel pressure as long as I was cranking, but as soon as I let off the key, it went to zero. I found the check valve issue at the trailing end of last summer so I haven't spent a full blown hot summer afternoon parked on the blacktop yet after getting that part sorted. This year will be the test for me. My artificial enrichment circuit got me through last summer. That was when I hooked up a relay in series with the temp sensor and fooled the ECU into thinking my engine was very very cold while it was cranking. This summer I'm hoping that a new check valve will make the electronic choke unnecessary. But I gotta get wheels under it first!! :classic:

Not regardless of the temp... Only squirts while cranking below 72F max. (FSM says the thermotime cuts out somewhere between 57-72F). 77 FSM page EF-14.

siteunseen, did you get those bellows you talked about? Are they the same ones I bought, or one of the other alternatives?

My pleasure. The pics of your hardware in your thread are a little different than what I found in mine, but hope the info helps anyway!

Haha! Some call me Obvious. I believe you are supposed to tighten the side rod until it bottoms out. And then once the side rod has bottomed out against the end of the rack, then you should lock it in place with the lock nut. If you're lucky, the side rod will have a stiffy at that point. If it's still all loose and floppy hanging once the side rod has bottomed out, then it's worn beyond the recommended limit. As for the order of the other two parts... Are they both threaded? I mean, obviously the lock nut (part with the flats) is threaded, but what about the other part? The part without the flats? I'm not even sure what that is. It's not in the manual pics... Also, what year manual are you looking at that said something about .22? I looked and couldn't find that.

Brian, Those pictures are perfect. Thanks for the closure.

I'm glad to hear your positive results as I'm doing pretty much the same thing on my 77. Wheel bearings, steering rack refurb, strut inserts, ball joints, tie rod ends, bushings everywhere... To make matters worse on mine, I've found a bunch of things that weren't put together properly from my previous owner. I'm hoping (maybe even expecting) huge improvements over what I started with.

bacarl, Awesome. Thanks for the confirmation! Pics of the original parts for future reference would be great when you get a chance.

The nuts that tamo3 posted are the original peen over style. They are not the ZX self-locking style.