Fuel Lift Pump Issue and Fuel Guage - Don't Laugh!

OK, another issue.
Lost power on the M5 last week and had to pull over and recovered back home. Had it with my classic bikes before and though fuel instantly, but was reading around 1/3 tank. Had a new britpart tank recently.
Check obvious bits and pieces on the hard shoulder, told off by the motorway officer. Lift pump wasn't feeding much through at all, so ordered some up and replaced yesterday. Turns out after all that, there wasn't enough fuel int he bloody tank! Laughable, pathetic, basically my fuel guage was giving me false readings so didn't even check the tank under the drivers seat. Anyway, lift pump was a tad knackered and on its way out, whether that was due to it working overtime trying to suck diesel through that wasn't there, I don't know. All learning curves I guess.

Anyway. Check sender unit and wiring and everything seems ok, at least there is power going to it when connected directly to the battery, so maybe a manual issue with the float. Anyone had these issues before. I know there is plenty in there, just another niggling issue I could do without.

Advice, tips, help, all appreciated. Ta

NightShadow91 said:

OK, another issue.
Lost power on the M5 last week and had to pull over and recovered back home. Had it with my classic bikes before and though fuel instantly, but was reading around 1/3 tank. Had a new britpart tank recently.
Check obvious bits and pieces on the hard shoulder, told off by the motorway officer. Lift pump wasn't feeding much through at all, so ordered some up and replaced yesterday. Turns out after all that, there wasn't enough fuel int he bloody tank! Laughable, pathetic, basically my fuel guage was giving me false readings so didn't even check the tank under the drivers seat. Anyway, lift pump was a tad knackered and on its way out, whether that was due to it working overtime trying to suck diesel through that wasn't there, I don't know. All learning curves I guess.

Anyway. Check sender unit and wiring and everything seems ok, at least there is power going to it when connected directly to the battery, so maybe a manual issue with the float. Anyone had these issues before. I know there is plenty in there, just another niggling issue I could do without.

Advice, tips, help, all appreciated. Ta

Click to expand...

My series 3 has the opposit problem, it has at least a quarter of a tank left when the guage is reading empty. I have thought about bending the float on the sender upwards a bit to see if that fixes it but I don't really want to disturb the sender gasket, cos once you do one little thing, half a dozen other little things crop up.

Col

Colthebrummie said:

My series 3 has the opposit problem, it has at least a quarter of a tank left when the guage is reading empty. I have thought about bending the float on the sender upwards a bit to see if that fixes it but I don't really want to disturb the sender gasket, cos once you do one little thing, half a dozen other little things crop up.

Col

Click to expand...

My logic exactly, every time I mess about, I get disastrous domino effects. Well, not always. I'll have another play later, it's turning into a Landy maintenance week again. Thanks

the sender arm got bent on re installation ?

I fitted a new petrol tank to my RRC some years ago when the original started to leak.
Was on my way to the cinema when the car just slowed to a stop - classic running out of petrol.
Fuel gauge showed I was just on the red which was usually fine for quite few miles but the engine was quite adamant it wasn't getting any petrol.
Put a gallon in out of a can & off we went again.
Thorough check at home & I found that the depth of the new tank measured from the pump flange (pump on top of tank, early 3.5EFi) was greater than the old tank so the end of the pickup tube was above the fuel. Sender unit for the level is fitted into the side of the tank on these so separate from the pump.
I now know that the fuel pickup tube length on mine is adjustable, which I didn't when I first fitted it to the new tank
Spoke to the supplier next time I was in & out of curiosity we looked at the other tanks he had in. No two were exactly the same depth.

My old 90 200tdi had the same fuel estimator as a gauge - ran out of juice twice showing 1/4full.

Replaced float and sender, improved but always hopelessly optimistic - then learnt that it was a common issue, so always filled up at 1/4full and carried a fuel can!

I go off mileage just in case

You know its a land rover when even the fuel gauge doesn't work properly