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Fuel Feed Problems - advice requested


TeeELL

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A couple of folk I know have problems with fuel feed on their respective boats, both of which are the 'syphon type' and both cause their engine to cut out at approx half tank level. In fairness their engines are not Barrus but Beta so your problem might not be to do with the engine type but with the boats fuel feed plumbing type. A previous post by BOATGYPSY within this thread gave what I thought to be an ingenious way of overcoming this problem.

 

You could confirm it by temporarily re-routing your feed to the lift pump into a 25 liter drum of diesel and see how it runs. If you need to refill the drum before it runs empty then it tends to suggest the problem is either with your lift pump (assuming the drum is higher than the motor and gravity is helping the flow) or the tank.

 

If you do suspect the stop-solenoid then disconnect it and stop the motor by moving the stop lever by hand. If the problem goes away then its a new solenoid or an intermittent short somewhere causing operation of the the existing solenoid.

 

Good luck

 

Ditchdabbler

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Brian

I have a Barrus Shire 1952 in a 2002 Liverpool boat, so guesss my set-up is the same as yours. The stop solenoid is normally open - ie lets fuel through. When you press the 'stop' button it activates the solenoid to close off the supply. I'm told that sometimes it can stick in the closed position - in which case you would never get the engine to start in the first place. I would have thought the chances of the solenoid spontaneously being activated are slight - unless there's a ghostly finger on the 'stop' button!

Rgds

Mike_N

 

 

Hi again Mike

Thanks for your interest. Just wonder if that "ghostly finger" may be in the form of a spontaneous discharge from a diesel-soaked stop-solonoid-relay ?? Guess where it is located ?.....right under the fuel filter assembly -and prongs up !!! Just on the off-chance...I'm changing it. I'll then fully test the engine and let you know the result. (Did you know that a stop-solonoid is £254.65 !)

Cheers,

Brian

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Hi again Mike

Thanks for your interest. Just wonder if that "ghostly finger" may be in the form of a spontaneous discharge from a diesel-soaked stop-solonoid-relay ?? Guess where it is located ?.....right under the fuel filter assembly -and prongs up !!! Just on the off-chance...I'm changing it. I'll then fully test the engine and let you know the result. (Did you know that a stop-solonoid is £254.65 !)

Cheers,

Brian

Why not disconnect it, or is it energised for open?

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Why not disconnect it, or is it energised for open?

 

Normally no current to stop-solonoid. current flows when stop-button on dash is pressed. If stop-solonoid was disconnected the engine would run, but I presume I could only stop it by physically pushing plunger on the solonoid itself. Okay for testing, but not long term. Will test when new stop-solonoid relay is fitted...with a cover to protect against diesel ingress !

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A friend had two diesel standby generators for his fish farm and ran both up every Monday for half an hour each....

 

One day he needed them as weather had done some serious damage to the power lines near him.... the generators came on but after two days, failed - reason was the dip tubes were too short and he had only half the fuel available he thought he had. However, as the tanks were still half full, this wasn't found for a few hours and he lost the whole farm.

 

So another "Dip tubes too short or cracked / perforated "

 

Nick

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