hey guys, have a problem... my 223 will be running great, idling well, lots of power, and then out of the blue it will start starving for fuel... my experience with both fuel pumps and carburetors has been that they just start doing something and then they keep doing it and doing it until it gets worse or until you fix it... or that they just stop working all together... but this problem is intermittent... last time it started doing this was a little over a week or so ago and I thought that I would need to work on the carburetor, so I parked it and left it there, a friend came over and I wanted him to listen to it so I started the truck and it was fine... it ran for the past half a week and started doing it again in the middle of a drive today...

the engine will still run, but not with full power, and it doesn't idle, you have to give it gas or it will die... when it dies, it doesn't start unless you give it gas again. if you pump the pedal a few times and leave the pedal alone it will fire right up as usual and die again, if you pump it and start it and keep on the throttle it will run, but it sounds obvious that it's not getting enough fuel..

I'm leaning towards the fuel pump but wanted your guys' opinion first since I won't really be able to mess with the truck until this weekend anyways... and again, I've never had a fuel pump half way go out and then come back full strength and then go half way out again...

thanks guys...

 

Assuming you have checked the fuel filter and lines for any kinks, you may want to pull the line off that feeds the pump to ensure the tank pickup filter is flowing good, if it is slow, you can blast a shot of compressed air back into the tank. Perhaps tank sediment is slowing flow.
Next would be ensuring there is no sediment or issues with the needle and seat in the carb, and while in there make sure the float level is set right.
Check for vacuum leaks, when you pump the pedal after it stalls, it tells me there's adequate fuel in the bowl, and since it'll stay running if you're on the throttle, it tells me there's adequate fuel flow to keep it at a high idle.
For it not to idle at all, I would suspect an obstruction in the idle circuit of the carb, improper idle air mixture setting, or a vacuum leak.

 

Sounds just like my truck when the fuel tank was rusty. Chunks of rust were getting stuck in the fuel line once-in-a-while and the truck would barely run. After sitting for a few hours, the rust would shift or break up enough that it would flow through the line and then get trapped in the filter.

The truck would run great until the next chunk of rust got caught in the line....probably near a tight bend. I temporarily solved the problem by using 3/8" fuel hose to bypass the line until I could find the time to clean out the fuel tank.

 

yeah, i just cleaned out the tank a few weeks ago and it was very clean... this morning I took off the bowl and there was some sediment in there so I cleaned out that whole area... there was plenty of gas in the bowl, so the fuel filter is fine... the truck ran great, until it started to skip a bit, it would lose power for maybe half a second then go right back to normal, I took off the bowl again (plenty of gas again), took out the inlet to the jet and cleaned it and put it all back together and it still has the skip... i'm thinking something is deeper in the carb... or maybe an ignition problem?

 

Yes, it could be ignition related, sometimes ignition and carb issues tend to show the same symptoms. I had a 65 Mustang that I chased a phantom carb problem for weeks, only to discover the problem was nothing more than a bad condenser. Once the engine got warm, the condenser would start acting up and it would run like a bag of... Put in a new condenser, ran super smooth.
My 66 F250 has a pertronix in it and I'm confident that it is one of the reasons that truck runs so perfectly. It doesn't skip a beat. I wouldn't consider upgrading to electronic ignition as throwing money at a mystery problem. It will make the engine run better regardless of other ailments the engine may have.

 

All 223 fuel pumps have a glass bowl attached to the pump, inside that bowl is either a ceramic or paper fuel filter.

The bowl will turn brown inside/outside over time, making it difficult to (1) see inside, or (2), even know that there is something inside it.

When was the last time the filter was changed?

Since most ppl don't know it's there, could be a year, could be 10 years.

The ceramic filter can be rinsed out with gasoline or a solvent, the paper filter when dirty, needs to be replaced.

It's also possible there is no filter inside that bowl, it could have been removed by a previous owner because it was clogged up.

Either he couldn't find a replacement (NAPA carries them) or just didn't bother replacing it.

Now...without it...there's no way to filter the gasoline from the tank to the carb, as this is the only fuel filter factory installed on a 223.

Original Ford and Motorcraft part numbers for the paper filter:

C3TZ-9365-A (Motorcraft FG-16) / Application: 1952/64 215/223 & 1954/64 239/256/292 Y Blocks.

The Motorcraft part number can be crossed over by autoparts stores to the brands they sell.

Can't find any?

Green Sales has 24 = 800-543-4959 / Dennis Carpenter has 23 = 704-786-8139 / Miller Obsolete Parts has 17 = 800-546-7278.

 

yes modeleh, it was ignition, i was chasing a phantom carb problem... the spark from the coil is skipping... my problem sounds like your mustang problem where it starts running bad when it gets warm... digging out the dwell tester and it's off to the distributor, because as far as I know coils just don't skip out, they just stop working, is that a fair assumption?

numberdummy- my fuel pump doesn't have a glass bowl on it, mine looks like this one:

Airtex Manufacturer Info

which seems to be the same as the one with the glass bowl, just with a metal , filterless bowl at the bottom... is it possible to get a glass bowl that will bolt onto this pump? I don't find a fuel filter anywhere in the system, so I'm probably just get an inline filter from NAPA, unless a glass bowl will somehow fit.

 

Aftermarket fuel pump sold by auto parts stores.

There's no way to adapt a glass bowl to this pump.