Questions and Answers

Pony Won't Gallop Long Q. I have an 1985 Hyundai Pony that was not driven for at least three years. I just had it safetied. 4 cylinder 1.4 liter engine Manual transmission 162,000 kilometers (100,650 miles) It has a carburetor

I have the following problem with it.

It will start up fine but after 1 to 5 km all of a sudden it slows down and dies. The first time it started right back up again. Every time after that I would have to wait about two hours before I could get it to start. Sometimes when I tried to accelerate this would also cause it to die out.

Today I put in a new fuel filter and air filter because I figured there was dirt in the fuel filter. Tonight I took it out for another test. It started up fine, after about 6 km it started to die, so I geared down. It continued to drive. I made a stop in town. It started up fine. I went to another place and stopped for about ½ hour. When I tried to start it again, it would start up but die right away. So I left it there of course.

Referring an auto manual it told me this could also indicate the carburetor needs to be cleaned or replaced, the fuel pump output needs to be checked.

Is it possible that it could be anything else? If so, what could it be, and is it something that can be fixed?

I will greatly appreciate your answer. I think you have a terrific site and it is great that you are taking your time to help other people.

A. You already hit on the two most probable causes. I would look at the fuel pump first. What you do is the next time it dies, don't try to start it, look in the carburetor and see if there is gas in it. There should be a sight glass on the side of the carburetor. If not, look down the throat of the carburetor and push the throttle all the way down. You should see a hard squirt of gas. If not, then you ran out of gas and the fuel pump needs to be replaced.

Another way to check it is to take off the inlet line on the fuel pump and connect a vacuum gauge to it. The needle should be nice and steady. If it bounces around the pump is NFG. If you have a fuel pressure tester, the spec for that fuel pump is about 13 to 14 psi.

I'll bet 50 cents in cold hard cash it's a bad fuel pump.

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