9 replies to this topic

[dinki]

ive recently bought an unfinished mini project,it has a 1340 med engine with a hif 44 carb.to get the car running so i could hear that the engine was ok,the seller used a squeezy bottle full of fuel to a facet fuel pump piped up to the carb to get the engine running.
my question is..do i need to use an elec pump for this setup or is there a better option?

[bmcecosse]

Just use the standard mechanical pump - it's fine!

[Guess-Works.com]

With an HIF44, the mechanical pump should be able to keep up with it, I run a mechanical on my 1330 with an HIF44 and even when it's doing less than 10mpg down the 1/4 it was not suffering fuel starvation.

[Mart8V]

I'm with GW- no problem with a mechanical one. Run one on my 1330 and it doesn't miss a beat even at high revs.

[Big_Adam]

Having had a mech one go ... wrong and spit petrol into the oil.

I go electric.

[Sherlock]

I second Big Adam on that, fitting an electronic pump was one of the wisest things I ever did to my Mini, easier starting, no more vapour lock in traffic jams in hot weather & no chance of filling the gearbox with petrol.

[Ethel]

The best excuse for a leccy pump is it lives at the back, near the tank, so is less effected by inertia trying to empty the fuel line when the car is being flung through the bends.

[dklawson]

All of my British cars will soon have electric fuel pumps. I like them because my cars are for the weekend and may sit for quite a while between drives. With the electric pump you switch on the ignition, give the pump a second or two to refill the float bowls and you're ready to start. Mechanical pumps will refill the bowls also but they obviously require you to crank the engine a bit to achieve the same thing.

Another nice thing about electric pumps is that they are easier to work with if you are trying to diagnose a fuel delivery issue. Quickly stopping the fuel flow is handy if you want to make sure the float bowls are full. Switch off the ignition key and the electric pump stops with no more fuel delivered to the carbs. With the mechanical pump it's very hard to achieve the same thing.

[Cooperman]

Plus then fact that with an electric pump you can hide a secret fuel pump switch. Then, if someone tries to steal the car it will start, run for maybe 100+ yards, then cut out. The would-be thief won't want to sit in the middle of the road searching for the fault and will, hopefully, just give up and 'leg it'.

[Sherlock]

Plus then fact that with an electric pump you can hide a secret fuel pump switch. Then, if someone tries to steal the car it will start, run for maybe 100+ yards, then cut out. The would-be thief won't want to sit in the middle of the road searching for the fault and will, hopefully, just give up and 'leg it'.

Exactly that happened 3 times when I had my Cooper 'S', thanks to the secret switch it was found each time within a few hundred yards, with no damage.