Advice required

[Ohearchai]

1990 Suburban, V1500, 4x4, 5.7 tbi, New fuel pump, filter, coil, etc. A shot of ether and the vehicle starts right up, without it no. When it starts good to go, drive for hours but once you stop, you will need to bust out the ether again. Suggestions anyone, thanks.

 

[Soundmound]

Welcome to the forum from North Central Washington. Someone will be along to help soon I'm sure, in the meantime...

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[nvrenuf]

"New fuel pump, filter, coil, etc."

First, what is "etc"? It makes a difference. Does that include the fuel filter? Fuel pump relay?

Second, if it starts with ether it's fuel related.

I'd rent a fuel pressure gauge kit from Autozone / whomever and check the pressure.

You can also rent the little test light things to see if you are getting power to the injectors.

 

[fast 99]

Sounds like low fuel pressure need to check that first.

 

[Bextreme04]

1990 Suburban, V1500, 4x4, 5.7 tbi, New fuel pump, filter, coil, etc. A shot of ether and the vehicle starts right up, without it no. When it starts good to go, drive for hours but once you stop, you will need to bust out the ether again. Suggestions anyone, thanks.

Fuel pump relay. The TBI engines have a bypass that runs through the oil pressure switch that provides power to the fuel pump when the engine is running even if the fuel pump relay is not working. So you are providing fuel to start it, which gives it oil pressure, which then provides power to the fuel pump, which then keeps it running correctly.

Stop throwing parts at it and troubleshoot it correctly. See if key on gives power to the fuel pump. If no power, then go check the relay. If the relay is fine, then check fuses to the relay. You can test all of that with a multimeter and not replacing a single part. If all of that is fine, then start looking at fuel pressure. The TBI injectors and FPR are notorious for getting clogged or leaking and causing issues.

 

[SirRobyn0]

I would bet on the fuel pump relay as well. It's really simple to test for power in and out of the relay.

I doubt it's a fuel pump, clogged filter or anything like that unless you have other runability symptoms. Generally you'd get some pretty serious runability issues if the pump or filter were the culprit, but then I'm sometimes surprised what people will tolerate. Anyhow check that relay!

 

[fast 99]

I'm sometimes surprised what people will tolerate. Anyhow check that relay!

Me too, we have vehicles come into the shop nearly every day that start hard, low brake pedal and so many warning lights on I don't know how they can see past the dash to drive at night.

 

[Hunter79764]

Another free test would be to turn key on but not start for ~5 seconds, turn it off, back on 5 seconds, repeat, then start. Each of those key cycles you should ideally hear the pump run for that time. If it starts in that condition, then its some kind of low pressure/flow restriction that's causing the pressure to build slowly but your relay system is good. If not (and/or you don't hear it run on key-on) then troubleshoot the proper operation like mentioned above because it is likely that circuit.