So when I bought the no rust 323 from Chad, he had jury rigged a wire from the radio to run the fuel pump, since it wouldn't start sometimes. Car made it home 250 miles fine but I didn't want to leave it like that. Plus in the process the gas gauge no longer worked. And the interior light did not work when you opened the doors.
First thing I looked at was the mickey mouse air intake, with the VAF hanging off the air pipe at an angle and jammed against the distributor cap, and no retaining clip on the VAF cable, which was halfway unplugged. Sure enough, had a 08 code set, bad VAF signal. Put all stock parts back from another car and disconnected the jumper - no more code, but no start, no pump.
Had good power at the relays, but at the pump jumper harness under the seat all the wires had random voltage which was different every time I measured. One of those wires isn't even connected to anything, since it is for low fuel warning, which this car doesn't have.
So I took the seats and carpet out to follow the harness, and found a plug in the harness which is not on the '91 diagram I have - car is '93. This is right where the left sill meets the bulkhead below the rear seat, at the bottom of the B post. The plug cleverly lies right on the floor under the carpet. Sometime in the past, somebody had "fixed" the pump power wire by removing it from the plug and splicing it with male/female slide connectors, badly crimped; then they put it all back making sure the splice was directly on the floor, to pick up any trace of salt water there might be. As soon as I touched this mess, the pump wire and the gauge wires fell apart. The plug was a mass of green powder. Every pin and wire was green powder. I had to cut out the plug and splice pieces in to all the wires there, very difficult since all the wires were corroded. Cut them all back a couple of inches and Very carefully scraped all the strands clean so I could solder them. There are a bunch of wires there that don't go through the plug, and I didn't have time to figure out what they are all for, but the plug had pump, gauge & ground, Low fuel light, brakelights, taillights, and two for the door switches for the interior lights which also trigger the auto belts.
I think the original problem was the VAF cable, but in crawling around to check the pump random feet made these wires fall apart, so anybody with problems on these circuits might want to look there, or better, look there before you have trouble and get that plug off the floor! I also don't know which cars have the plug that is not shown in the '91 diagram. And remember that this is a car with NO RUST that rarely ever saw salt or snow, so most of them may be much worse.
So after working all night, I had power at the pump harness, and the interior lights worked, but no gauge and no pump run! Took the tank unit out and the gauge sender is DOA, and the pump doesn't fit in the brackets right (too big) and is about to fall off. Put the tank unit from the other car in and have gauge but no pump!
Examined the wire where the jumper had been and found that the GD Scotchlok connector - too small size - had cut all but two strands of the pump power wire. Spliced that, still no pump, unless I held the connector in my hand - hard to drive that way. Looked inside the harness plug at the pump jumper harness, and saw that the power pin was dark instead of silvery, that usually means it has been hot and is oxidised so doesn't make contact. It probably started with the original problem that they were working on when they spliced the power wire under the carpet, likely a dead shorted pump. So, I bent the harness plug pin into a gentle "S" bend and put OxGard on it, and that made contact and did the trick.
So that is about 5 things in the pump circuit that could cause intermittent or permanent pump death at any moment, ALL of them due to bad workmanship over the years.
Moral of the story is FIND the PROBLEM and FIX IT RIGHT or you WILL be plagued forever with weird crap! (at least, I HOPE it is YOU and NOT ME!)
FRM
First thing I looked at was the mickey mouse air intake, with the VAF hanging off the air pipe at an angle and jammed against the distributor cap, and no retaining clip on the VAF cable, which was halfway unplugged. Sure enough, had a 08 code set, bad VAF signal. Put all stock parts back from another car and disconnected the jumper - no more code, but no start, no pump.
Had good power at the relays, but at the pump jumper harness under the seat all the wires had random voltage which was different every time I measured. One of those wires isn't even connected to anything, since it is for low fuel warning, which this car doesn't have.
So I took the seats and carpet out to follow the harness, and found a plug in the harness which is not on the '91 diagram I have - car is '93. This is right where the left sill meets the bulkhead below the rear seat, at the bottom of the B post. The plug cleverly lies right on the floor under the carpet. Sometime in the past, somebody had "fixed" the pump power wire by removing it from the plug and splicing it with male/female slide connectors, badly crimped; then they put it all back making sure the splice was directly on the floor, to pick up any trace of salt water there might be. As soon as I touched this mess, the pump wire and the gauge wires fell apart. The plug was a mass of green powder. Every pin and wire was green powder. I had to cut out the plug and splice pieces in to all the wires there, very difficult since all the wires were corroded. Cut them all back a couple of inches and Very carefully scraped all the strands clean so I could solder them. There are a bunch of wires there that don't go through the plug, and I didn't have time to figure out what they are all for, but the plug had pump, gauge & ground, Low fuel light, brakelights, taillights, and two for the door switches for the interior lights which also trigger the auto belts.
I think the original problem was the VAF cable, but in crawling around to check the pump random feet made these wires fall apart, so anybody with problems on these circuits might want to look there, or better, look there before you have trouble and get that plug off the floor! I also don't know which cars have the plug that is not shown in the '91 diagram. And remember that this is a car with NO RUST that rarely ever saw salt or snow, so most of them may be much worse.
So after working all night, I had power at the pump harness, and the interior lights worked, but no gauge and no pump run! Took the tank unit out and the gauge sender is DOA, and the pump doesn't fit in the brackets right (too big) and is about to fall off. Put the tank unit from the other car in and have gauge but no pump!
Examined the wire where the jumper had been and found that the GD Scotchlok connector - too small size - had cut all but two strands of the pump power wire. Spliced that, still no pump, unless I held the connector in my hand - hard to drive that way. Looked inside the harness plug at the pump jumper harness, and saw that the power pin was dark instead of silvery, that usually means it has been hot and is oxidised so doesn't make contact. It probably started with the original problem that they were working on when they spliced the power wire under the carpet, likely a dead shorted pump. So, I bent the harness plug pin into a gentle "S" bend and put OxGard on it, and that made contact and did the trick.
So that is about 5 things in the pump circuit that could cause intermittent or permanent pump death at any moment, ALL of them due to bad workmanship over the years.
Moral of the story is FIND the PROBLEM and FIX IT RIGHT or you WILL be plagued forever with weird crap! (at least, I HOPE it is YOU and NOT ME!)
FRM
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