[Mgs] 74 B stalls on right hand corners, Mk II

Eric Markley ericemarkley at bellsouth.net
Thu Sep 4 07:48:29 MDT 2008


Hello Paul,

You are confirming my thoughts from last night. Find a empty parking lot
with very little traffic and drive the car until I can get the problem to
happen again. Then examine the fuel filter and eliminate fuel starvation as
a cause. That leaves electrical issues, flooding, or other carb issues.

My brother replaced the fuel pump when he had the car. The pump is a
Pierburg electronic fuel pump. It appears to be very similar to an SU pump
but does not have points. The next logical question to answer is how much
fuel pressure does it produce. I will check that. Next, what might the fuel
pump be doing while the car is in the process of stalling.

When the problem occurred one time last year, I let the car sit for a 30-45
minutes while having lunch and the car restarted normally. That was a very
hot summer day in the 90s (or 30s) and my first thought was vapor lock. As
the problem has happened again with lower ambient and vehicle  temperatures,
I think vapor lock is less likely.

Time to find that empty parking lot.
  -----Original Message-----
  From: Paul Hunt [mailto:paul.hunt1 at blueyonder.co.uk]
  Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2008 3:54 AM
  To: Eric Markley; MG LIST
  Subject: Re: [Mgs] 74 B stalls on right hand corners, Mk II


  Actually it is the Bentley manual that looks like the Leyland manual, as
the former is a reprint of the latter.

  Now we know there is a strong fuel smell as well it points even more to
flooding, which would eliminate anything causing fuel starvation such as
sediment in the tank or lines, especially as the filter is clear.  Also
because of the float chambers it would have to be a very loooooong
right-hand bend to get starvation to affect the engine.  But the other odd
thing is that unless both carbs are affected it really should start easier
than that especially when hot, and the only thing that could flood both
carbs is if the pump suddenly started pumping at significantly higher
pressure.  What pump do you have?  If it were only one carb then I'd expect
it to restart easier than that, firing on two cylinders, even though the
carbs are cylinders have the interconnecting balance pipe.

  OTOH if it were an *electrical* i.e. ignition fault taking several seconds
to clear, then cranking all that time with the throttle wide open *would*
put unburnt fuel in the exhaust and give a strong smell.  I appreciate it
normally happens when you don't want to be left hanging around, but for the
purposes of diagnosis I'd be taking it round deserted car parks to see if I
could reproduce it, and hence have more time for diagnosis, like leaving bit
for a minute or so to see if it fires up right away after a delay.

  PaulH.

    ----- Original Message -----


    There is a VERY strong smell of fuel when I get the car restarted.


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