{"id":19355,"date":"2015-10-13T09:25:26","date_gmt":"2015-10-13T16:25:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=19355"},"modified":"2016-11-30T15:05:29","modified_gmt":"2016-11-30T23:05:29","slug":"installing-a-high-flow-fuel-sending-unit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/installing-a-high-flow-fuel-sending-unit\/","title":{"rendered":"Installing a High Flow Fuel Sending Unit"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you’ve ever buried your foot to the floor on the drag strip, and run into a stumble, there’s something that becomes clear in a big hurry: Getting the fuel from the tank to the carb is rather important. \u00a0If you don’t have sufficient fuel, then the ET slip will certainly reflect it. \u00a0In fact, in some vintage cars, fuel delivery is so poor, you can actually feel the deficiency as you wind through the gears. \u00a0A big part of the puzzle for any car is to supply a sufficient volume of gasoline. \u00a0Now you might think this is all very simple. \u00a0The reality is, it’s not – especially if you want to get it done with a lone stock style mechanical fuel pump. \u00a0 This article is all about the importance of having the right fuel sending unit for your setup.<\/p>\n

Ponder this: You’re kicking back a good old-fashioned milkshake. \u00a0Instead of using that big fat straw the shake normally comes with, substitute it for the itsy-bitsy straw you’d normally use with a soda pop. \u00a0You’ll soon discover that sucking that mouthful of shake isn’t exactly easy. \u00a0Replace that soda pop straw with a big milk shake straw and it’s pretty comfortable. \u00a0The same applies to a fuel system. \u00a0That’s why some performance cars from the musclecar-era were factory-fitted with larger than standard diameter fuel lines (for example, a 3\/8-inch line instead of a more common 5\/16-inch or smaller jobs). \u00a0The problem is, the big bottleneck isn’t right at the fuel line. \u00a0It begins way before that with the sending unit.<\/p>\n

The fuel sender is absolutely critical. \u00a0A big restriction in a production line fuel delivery system is the fuel tank pickup\/sending unit combination. \u00a0If you’re building a high flow arrangement, you have two choices: Try to find a 3\/8-inch replacement pickup and sending unit (these were used on select big engine muslcecars and in some cases, they’re not exactly easy to find) or copy what plenty of F.A.S.T. guys do: Replace the factory sender\/pickup with a custom billet job from the folks at RobbMc Performance Products. \u00a0The RobbMc setup is based upon a huge\u00a0\u00bd-inch diameter pickup and it does away with the troublesome sock filter the OEM replacements come with. \u00a0The dilemma with the sock is that it can become plugged and you don’t know it. \u00a0Fuel flow goes down and, obviously, so does performance. \u00a0The custom pickup requires an external fuel filter (not a bad idea for any car), but otherwise bolts into place as stock. \u00a0It’s a slick piece and if you’re searching for maximum fuel flow from a stock gas tank, this is the place to begin.<\/p>\n

Now RobbMc doesn’t just offer one style of sender. \u00a0They have several different versions for a wide array of vintage iron. \u00a0You can order it with a conventional<\/p>\n

\u00bd-inch tube outlet\/return or you can specify -8AN or even -10AN outlet and return lines.\u00a0 Case-in-point is the setup shown in the accompanying photos. It\u2019s designed for a first generation Camaro (or 1968-74 Nova or other GM X-body).\u00a0 And as you can see, it comes equipped with -8AN male fittings on both the feed and return lines. In our case, we didn\u2019t need a return, so it was simply capped. It\u2019s all very cool and extremely well built.<\/p>\n

The bottom line here is, these trick senders\/fuel pickups end fuel starvation right at the source. They\u2019re not even that expensive.\u00a0 The RobbMc (http:\/\/www.robbmcperformance.com\/<\/a>) piece shown here costs $149.00 plus an additional $20.00 for the -8AN package.\u00a0 For a closer look, check out the accompanying photos:<\/p>\n

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Instead of trying to make a factory sender work, check out this option: This is a billet \u00bd-inch pickup offered by RobbMc Performance. As you can see in this photo, there is no provision for fuel filter sock. More in the next photo:<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The RobbMc pickup is simply wide open inside the tank. The pickup measures \u00bd-inch. As pointed out in the text, you have to add an in-line fuel filter. RobbMc makes similar pickups for a wide cross section of vintage applications.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The float is a high quality piece. Ditto with the actual sending unit, which by the way is designed to work with the stock production line fuel level gauge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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On the topside, the RobbMc pickup is engineered for use with return line, if needed. If you don’t need one (as in our application), simply use an AN cap to plug the extra line (ours came with the return line pre-capped). The actual feed line is also equipped with an -8AN male outlet (a $20 option).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Here’s a look at the RobbMc pickup installed in the tank. Installation is a breeze. Simply drop the supplied O-ring into the tank bung, line up the pickup and tighten the lock ring. Simple. As far as wiring for the gas gauge is concerned, the black wire is the ground. The positive red wire goes to the factory wiring harness connector.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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With the tank installed, here’s how the feed and return lines look. As you can see plumbing becomes simple with a capital “S”. We dig this setup – a lot!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Having sufficient fuel reaching the carb is important for the strip. Learn how to install a high flow fuel sending unit.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":19363,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3465,5008,11,9],"tags":[2,3545,4800,461,321],"class_list":["post-19355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-engine","category-how-tos","category-tech-tips","tag-drag-racing","tag-fuel-lines","tag-how-tos","tag-tech-tips-2","tag-wayne-scraba"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/featuredimage2.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-52b","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19355"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27520,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19355\/revisions\/27520"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}