Hey all, I'm trying to help my friend out with his 1999 Astro. The fuel pump was replaced about a year ago. When You turn the key, you can hear the pump priming. It is really loud though, much louder than I would expect it to be. I checked for pressure and got nothing but a bit of fuel dribbling out of the valve. It has spark as starting fluid will get it to kick. The fuel guage reads just under 1/4 tank and I added two gallons as well. Could the pump be bad while still making noise or is there something else that could be causing the lack of pressure?

 

The fuel pump could very well be bad. When it was replaced last year was an off brand of pump used. The cheap off brands usually don't last very long especially if the van is always driven with very little gas in the tank. When replacing the fuel pump use either Delco or Delphi pumps. With the work involved in changing them it is not worth putting in a cheap off brand.

 

I'm not sure what brand was used, I usually do the work on this vehicle but was unavailable at the time and he had another friend do the work. I know his girlfriend loves to drive this thing on fumes all the time. I was hoping with the pump still making noise I wouldn't have to drop the tank.

 

New pump time.

 

I'd change the filter first. Its an inline filter along the frame on the driver side. You're going to want to change it anyway and it's only like $10 compared to the $200+ pump. The pump can be a pain to change out. I did mine recently and had to break the lines to the tank since they were so rusty I couldn't get them loose. Those are a pain to replace too..... I finally got the old ones off after soaking with some PB penetrant and tapping on them.

 

I got the pump swapped out, and it fired right up. It was a lot easier than I expected. The pump had a 12 month warranty but it died on the 13th month. The store honored the warranty anyway as they agreed it was pretty retarded to fail in such a timely manner. My friend plans on getting rid of the van now anyway since he really has no use for it anymore. He's looking for an S-10 truck or blazer now. Thanks for the help guys, it's much appreciated.