The other day I decided to take the 72 for a spin. Went a couple of miles and heading back home it starts cutting out and dying. Then it just wouldn't start. Figured I was out of gas and put a few gallons in. I've had a non-working gas gauge and so that's why I figured I was out of gas. It started right up and made it home with no other issues. At fill up I wrote down the mileage to track how far aprox I could go on a full tank. I've gone 59 miles. Can't imagine I'd be out of gas already.
I don't know if it has a built in filter ( I'll look in my books for one and where). Could it be crud in the gas tank? How do I install a fuel filter without having to cut the metal lines and iusing the rubber hoses? I'm a little worried about a fuel fire.
The other day I decided to take the 72 for a spin. Went a couple of miles and heading back home it starts cutting out and dying. Then it just wouldn't start. Figured I was out of gas and put a few gallons in. I've had a non-working gas gauge and so that's why I figured I was out of gas. It started right up and made it home with no other issues.
I don't know if it has a built in filter ( I'll look in my books for one and where). Could it be crud in the gas tank? How do I install a fuel filter without having to cut the metal lines and iusing the rubber hoses? I'm a little worried about a fuel fire.
If you are running out of gas a change of the filter will not help you.
The factory used a nylon mesh sock on the pick-up tube in the tank and either a paper filter inside a steel canister in the line between the fuel pump and the carburetor or a paper or sintered bronze filter in the carb inlet behind the one inch nut. That steel nut has steel threads because it is machined from a solid steel rod. It is as hard as steel. Your carburetor however is made of pot metal (a Zinc and lead alloy that is so soft you can scratch it with your finger nail) so the fine female threads in the carb inlet are very easy to strip out. If you cross thread the fitting going back in it will destroy your threads and your carburetor requiring you to buy an aftermarket O-ring sealed repair kit to stop the leak of gasoline on top of your hot motor.
By the way you can not use a paper filter with gas-o-hol or the stuff they sell today. This is because alcohol absorbs water out of the air and paper and water do not work well together. You need a alcohol friendly fiberglass fiber filter to replace the paper filter or the sintered bronze filter that GM used on their high performance cars.
My bad. I went in and edited the original post but I'm seeing I must have done something wrong as I don't see my edit.
Being as the gas gauge was broke I wanted to track my mileage to know roughly how far I could go on a full tank. I have only gone 59 miles since fill up. I'm not sure what else it could be if not a filter being or line being clogged by crud. But I'm low in exp too.
It is a long shot but recently my car (70) had similar symptoms. It would cut out and die when I came out to a stop or driving slowly. It would start right back though. It turned out to be the gasket between carb mounting plate and carb itself. It was leaking air out.
As to the fuel filter in addition to the built-in filter into the carb body, I was running steel braided rubber hose from the fuel pump to the carb with inline filter for over 2.5 years. No problems at all. I just changed it to a high heat rubber hose last week and so far still no leaks. Reason for change: steel braid started to rust and looked crappy.
I could write a laundry list of things it could be but, your best bet is take it to a real mechanic (an old mechanic not a freshly minted one) to trouble shoot your issues as it does no good to have an experienced mechanic talking to you by way of the internet.
I mention experienced older guys because points disappeared back in 1976 and carburetors where gone by 1987 so a lot of younger mechanics have never seen a car like yours. They are closer to a computer tech today than a mechanic that can easily diagnose your ills by looking at it and listening to it.
One of my vehicles was surging under acceleration, thought it was a plugged fuel filter (on the inlet line to the carb), but turned out that the fuel pump was going bad. At first we thought the gauge was off and it was out of gas, but it wasn't. I would double check that there is gas in it, and change the fuel pump (they're cheap).
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