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Date:         Sun, 10 Feb 2013 13:43:11 -0500
Reply-To:     David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Subject:      Re: Copious Fuel Leak at Both Manifolds
Comments: To: Steve Williams <sbw@SBW.ORG>
In-Reply-To:  <201302101648.r1AGmt603292@sbw.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 11:47 AM 2/10/2013, Steve Williams wrote: >Why did the leak generally NOT occur when I drove every day? I just >can't think of a mechanism where sitting idle would cause an initial leak.

The system still has full pressure in it when it shuts down -- if the injectors don't leak it will keep this pressure a long time. Once it finally leaks down apparently it's allowing a leak to develop which then takes a few minutes under pressure to close up. Since it's suddenly gotten worse, either ambient conditions have changed or the hose-end is continuing to deteriorate.

Suggest if practical (not corroded badly) tighten the hose clamps on the manifold (fuel rail). You'll likely find the leak will stop and you can arrange to deal with replacing hoses and clamps on a convenient schedule. If the metal band securing the cap on the rail comes adrift the cap will fly off or otherwise give a huge un-ignorable leak, so that's not your issue. If the hose ends are split then they obviously need replacing promptly. If not you may find that taking up the hose clamps is all that's needed for the moment. If US-sized fuel-hose clamps were used they likely could not be tightened enough to begin with, as they have only a very small adjustment range (this type of clamp has a solid band surrounding the hose, and is tightened by a small screw that pulls two ears together at the side. If regular band clamps were used that shouldn't be an issue, but they still could have been under-tightened to begin with.

The OEM clamps at the injector had no moving parts and simply captured the end of the hose under a lip surrounding the hose barb. I've seen those weep a bit when the fuel rail was disturbed on my '84 after I decided to leave them in place when replacing the hoses the first time. After that I cut them off and used standard fuel-hose clamps instead (which came in the kit I'd gotten, I was just intrigued by the OEM clamping setup). I suspect that if I'd used dealer hose for those connections the original clamps would have continued to work as they did originally.

Yours, David


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