I have 1988 Celebrity 2.5L TBI giving me what I suspect is fuel delivery grief. It has ~130K miles on it, but has always been well maintained.
Symptoms are:
1) requires long (more than 5secs) crank period to fire off on cold start after sitting overnight. Always used to fire right off.
2) If initial cranking stopped after 1-2 seconds, then it fires off almost immediately on 2nd crank attempt and runs normally. But, must crank engine on first attempt; just turning on ignition (fuel pump activated) doesn't due the "trick."
3) After engine at operating temperature and shut off for about 15-20 minutes, on restart it fires off immediately and then dies unless accelerator is pumped while it stumbles really bad for a few seconds. It settles out gradually requiring less and less pumping and after several minutes then runs normal again.
4) It sets no codes...OBDI...grrr
My fuel pressure gauge is for high pressure systems (0-100 psi range) and the fuel pressure on the tank side of the fuel filter with the TBI side blocked off measured 8psi (maybe 9). The spec. is 9-13 psi. Should I believe the gauge and condemn the pump or assume it meets the minimum pressure requirement (9-13 psi)? Do fuel pumps gradually loose pressure like that with age? The ones I've experienced failing (only two) just quit pumping or pumped erratically. The other fuel pressure problem I encountered was due to a leak in a rubber hose between the pump output and the steel line inside the tank. That pump was replaced by a supposed reputable shop which obviously didn't replace the short section of rubber hose when the pump was replaced.
My other suspicion is the fuel regulator, but I don't have the right adapters... to connect the pressure gauge and monitor fuel pressure with the engine running and pinching off the return... yet.
Any other ideas what may be causing this problem?
Thanks!