Smoking electric fuel pump

[Brad1968]

We managed to leave the ignition in the on position with the engine shut down while we were out sailing this weekend. She's a '79 with an Atomic 4.

About 30 minutes into the sail, black smoke started rolling out of the engine compartment.

We managed to quickly shut off the fuel supply and shut down the power before smoldering transitioned to open flame.

We sailed a few miles back into the harbor and into our slip without incident. On postmortem inspection I realized the PO had bypassed the oil pressure safety switch and the power was wired with no inline fuse.

Looks like a couple hundred bucks and some weekend re-wiring should put everything back in order.

Bit sobering to realize how close this came to a major on-board incident.

If you're running an electric fuel pump make sure it's fused with an inline 5A fuse and wired through an oil pressure safety switch.

 

[Old Skool Neil]

Brad,

I bet your coil is history too.

 

[Brad1968]

Was guessing the same thing myself. I'll find out this weekend.

Managed to find the Facet 476087E fuel pump for $75 from Chief Aircraft up in Oregon. Local chandleries were asking $120-$140.

The rest should be easy to find locally.

 

[Old Skool Neil]

Electronic ignition or points?

 

[Brad1968]

Sorry for the long delay.

Points and condenser.

I swapped out the old fuel pump with the new, re-wired a bit to put the oil pressure safety switch back inline (it was functional but bypassed), ran some basic diagnostics, and fired it right up.

A few daysails and a trip to Catalina and back and it seems to be doing fine.

Now back to everything else on the to-do list...

 

[Old Skool Neil]

Sounds like your points were open during the ignition-on/engine-off episode which saved the coil.

Are you a member of the Moyer Marine forum (Atomic 4 forum)? To prevent such an oversight we recommend the installation of an oil pressure/temp alarm system. Key-on/engine-off means no oil pressure and the buzzer is going crazy.

We're neighbors. I'm in Cabrillo too.

 

[Brad1968]

Nice to get a little lucky and have the points open.

The oil pressure / temp warning (the puck) equipment is installed on the engine, but I haven't spent any time digging into it yet. Sounds like that should go on the list.

I am not a member of the Moyer Marine forum but probably should be.

We've recently moved our boat around to King Harbor and are liking it so far. Which marina are you in down in Cabrillo?