Ok ok ok... Well its been a long while since my last post... My truck has been at a nice standstill... I got it looking the way I wanted and it did run very nice for a very long time...

Heres what went down...
-Yesterday I drove the truck about 100 miles, no problems at all.. Ran great...
-This morning I hopped in and started her up.. Drove her gently as I always do until she warms up a little (till the needle starts moving)..
-At bottom of hill at a light waiting to turn left, truck is idiling fine and trace adkins is coming across the radio loud and clear...
- Light is green! Off to work we go!
- Wait a second... Off to work we dont go.. I have NO... Let me emphasize "NO" power... It runs real rough... like its running on a few cylinders when it chooses to do so..
- At idle it was running like it should just dont touch the gas...
- Instead of a left I made a U turn and went back up the hill to my house.. almost made it to my parking spot and she kick the bucket!


I whipped out my diablo predator and checked for codes not really paying attention I read multiple cylinder misfire.. without thinking I flasked the ecu back to factory and tried to start it up.. sputtered for a second like it was gunna kick on and nothing... Pushed it into my parking spot and there she sits...

I wiggled the spark plug wires in a lame attempt to fix it so I could leave my wife and our 3 week old baby with a car.. No joy...

So anyways.. I have the car and my beast is parked...

When I get home I am going to start pulling plugs, compression checks to follow on the most accessabel cylinders.. if I can test the wire I will do that..

Does anybody have any other suggestions?

 

Alright... So... I called the chevy dealership and they want to instantly chalk it up to a faulty fuel pump..

Has anybody replaced a fuel pump in their truck? Do-able in a parking spot with 2 jack stands, no jack and a pretty good set of tools?

 

I have done it twice. once by jacking up the truck and dropping the tank....that was time consuming but do-able.

The second time I helped a buddy of mine do it, and with his we removed the bed of the truck. If i remember right there were only 4 bolts or so that held the bed on. Then we just replaced the pump while the gas tank was still attached to the frame.

The second method was much easier.

 

Fuel pressure test.

 

I agree!

Do a pressure test like already mentioned first, but it sounds like that might be the culprit. I had the same thing happen to me. Running great one second and then BAM dead!

 

You guys are awesome! HA! Take the bed off.. Thats thinking outside the box if you ask me! perfect! Alright.. yesterday I got hung up on taking care of the Wife and baby so I couldnt wrench on anything.. Today I wont be able to do so either...

I dont have a fuel pressure tester, I was thinking about taking off the fuel filter and turning the key on to see if I get gas or not. What do you think about that?

One more thing.. Is the fuel pump fused? If so where the heck is it? I looked in the easy areas under the hood in that fuse box and inside the cab on the end of the dash. Anywhere else it could be?

 

ok, to check for spark: pull plug, connect to wire, ground to engine and crank it over?

To check compression (to see if cam/valves are working) I would only have to do 1 cylinder to verify or do I need to do as many as possible?

What does a "fouled plug" exactly look like? For instance, what would be BAD?

Checking fuel pressure regulator? Just yank vacuum line off and check for fuel? My engine will not start, will just cranking make enough vacuum?

Fuel filter feels like I am gunna rip my truck in half trying to get it off, any suggestions? Reversed threads? Communist fuel filter? Im not as strong as I thought(yeah right, I am MAN)?

 

I would just check all the fuses in both fuse boxes. Removing the filter and turning the key on won't really tell you much, because you can still get fuel without the proper pressure to run the motor. You can also swap the fuel pump relay with another known good one to see if it might be that, although I have never had one go bad. Do you hear the pump come on for a few seconds when you turn the key on? Most of the time these pumps will tell you when they are going bad by getting pretty loud. I ignored mine hoping to get a few more miles out of it and it left me stranded. I can't blame the truck it was trying to tell me. Also, taking the bed off is much easier than dropping the tank, plus you lessen the risk of pulling on the wires and hoses and damaging them. 2 or 3 guys can lift it with no problem. All you need to do is slide it back far enough to get to the tank. You can rest the bed on the tires and bumper and have enough clearance. You might be able to borrow a fuel pressure tester from a local auto parts store to check it. If the pressure is low I would put a new filter on and recheck just to rule out the cheap and easy stuff. Good luck!

 

Ok.. So this afternoon, I dug in a little bit..

I had my wife sit in the truck and turn the key on and off. The relay for the fuel pump kicks on just like it should. I put my ear to the gas tank and had her cycle the key several times and I couldn't hear anything. No pumping sounds at all... So maybe the pump is shot.. That would be a bummer...

So after I get a new set of wrenches (most of them walked away somehow). I am going to crack that fuel filter off and then give the key a few good cranks.

Okay.. So I pulled a plug (2nd one back on the drivers side). It looked okay I guess (photo attached)... I screwed in the compression tester and got about 170ish so It is working properly.. I put the plug in the wire, grounded it and cranked the engine over and was getting spark (orange spark?). So it is getting FIRE!

I pulled the intake tube off and cleaned all the crap off the butterfly and the throttle body, yuck.. might as well have been tar. So it is breathing, its getting AIR.

I also popped off the vacuum like to the fuel regulator and there was nothing, but not really too much vacuum at 150ish RPM.

What do we need to complete our fire triangle? FUEL! Thats gotta be it!

ill run down the parts here in the next day or so.. New plugs are in order (with anti gauling compound!). New fuel filter, new CABIN AIR FILTERs! Thats a whole new thread in itself. I had half the California desert in my filters! My truck should be twice as fast just because of that!

If I find that the fuel pump is busted what should I go with AC Delco or whatever aftermarket pump I can find?

 

Personally I have heard horror stories about the aftermarket pumps and this is not one of those jobs that you want to do twice. So I always use Delco/Delphi pumps. Was your pump very loud before it quit? One thing that is hard on these pumps is running the truck under a 1/4 tank of gas frequently. The pump sits in the tank right at that level and does not get the fuel around it (which is what cools the pump) there. Sounds like you are on the right track. Those plugs do look like they have seen better days.
Your other previous questions...
When doing a compression check you have to do all the cylinders to compare them to each other and against factory spec. I would bet against this on your truck. Sounds like a fuel issue to me.

A fouled plug will be very black or covered in fuel. A "bad" plug could have a few different issues like a broken or cracked tip. Yours are slightly black, but I don't think enough to be fouled. The perfect burning plug should be a nice clean tan color.

The fuel pressure regulator should not have fuel inside the vacuum line. If it does it is leaking and is bad.

Fuel filter removal. They can be tight. Just make sure you have one wrench on the line and the other on the filter so you don't twist the line. And remember they are facing opposite directions so one will loosen by turning up and the other down. Just make sure you are turning the line fitting counter clockwise.
Hope this helps!
Good luck man!