<hr style="color:#D1D1E1; background-color:#D1D1E1" size="1"> After a summer of fuel issues , my son was driving home with me in the passenger seat , and he finished the front tank about 1 1/2 miles from home . I flipped the switch for him and just before our drive I started to smell fuel , and then saw fuel coming out from under the dog house . He pulled in front of the shop , and as he backed up to park , it stalled and died . There was a pin hole leak in the rubber return line at the back of the motor which was fixed by replacing with new , 6" piece of rubber hose . The van refused to start and I managed to let the smoke out of the solenoid and burn up at least one of the starter windings . Now there is a new starter installed , new solenoid on the radiator support and a used lift pump installed and it fires right up but smokes like it's the dead of winter and I can see a trickle of fuel coming off the top of the filter housing . A friend let me harvest a filter housing from his F350 of the same era but it is a very different beast . The van housing seems to be integrated into a tall riser rather than the sort of angle iron bracket that is used on the F series .

First of all , does anyone have one of these housings that they would want to sell , or have an idea if the leak is related to something other than a break in that piece ?

Secondly , why would there be such a smoke screen after , what seems like , a fairly uneventful malfunction ?

and the reply from IDIDieselJohn in the van forum:



Can't swap these parts from a truck-van or vice versa.

What color is the smoke? It could still have air in the lines, and will clear up after driving it for a while.

There is a little O-ring in the filter head. They can leak after 20+ years.



Where is the o ring situated in the housing ?

 

The o-ring John was talking about is where the wire plugs in for the fuel heater. On the F series it is on the top of the flter head. I would guess that it would also be on the top on the E series.

 

Read through this thread.

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/8...ns-w-pics.html

 

Thanks , I may be time and money ahead to convert to an after market filter housing at this point and make provisions for a second filter at the same time since I would like to do a vegetable oil conversion at some point .

 

After burning up your starter, it might be a good idea to install an Electric Fuel Pump.

 

I did consider that and have a Dodge Cummins pump fitted to an add on bracket for the F series filter housing . There will be one when I go WVO for sure , I'm just trying to get up and running cheap and fast at the moment to complete my fall hauling tasks and get some hunting trips in .

With the replacement pump installed it fires up immediately now but I have this big cloud of blue/white smoke to figure out .

 

This problem will not go away ! We pulled the filter housing and replaced the O rings in the heater , then found a leak from the bottom of the filter . With both of those stopped the motor started great and idled with minimal to no smoke . In the course of the filter work , my buddy pulled this from the injector return line at the filter housing :



I fired it up tonight and took it up the road , there was much stuttering and I laid down a pretty heavy , blue smoke screen for 2 miles . When I turned around , I couldn't get enough power to shift into second and crawled back at about 7 mph .

the first question is , what is that little plastic thing doing in the fuel line ? Second is how did this all go from a failed? lift pump to a disabled vehicle ?!!!

 

I forgot to add that when we checked the bleeder on the filter body there was VERY high pressure !

 

Dude, there should be about 5-7 PSI MAX. You can over pressurize the IP which effectively retards the timing until it will quit. Try removing the tube from the top of the IP and put another line on to catch the excess fuel. If that takes care of the problem, you've got a problem in the return line. Another thing you can do is measure the pressure at the shrader valve. It should no be over 7 PSI.