Fuel pulsation dampner, and fuel line q's ?!

[Guard1an]

yea its that little bastard between the steel fuel line on the fire wall, and the plastic line going to the fuel rail. Is it really needed ? Well I had to replace the 2 o-ring's inside the damn thing (PITA !!!) cause it was leaking, but I was thinking is it really needed ? also is it better to replace that piece of plastic line (WTF?!!!) with something with some substance like FI rubber line, or even some steel braided line ?

[fixitmattman]

Is it good to have it, yes. 100% required, no. As long as it's still in place and functioning fine, there's no need to go modifying or removing it.

The last car I owned had a damper in the sending unit, it started leaking and it was only available by purchasing the whole sending unit. Rather than doing that I replaced it with a piece of fuel injection hose and it was fine ever since. Lasted right up until we got rid of the car several years later.

[Guard1an]

But what is its purpose ? I called the local Chrysler dealer, and they didn't know. Niether did NAPA, autozone, advance auto (there both a bunch of idiots any way) I run circles around them anyway when it comes to parts look up besides how would you know if it took a poo ? idin't see any movine parts inside it,

-Mike

[fixitmattman]

Wow, I could see maybe napa not knowing, but the dealer - wow, don't go there for service.

It's job is to reduce (dampen) the shock loading/pulsing in the fuel system. Think of a garden hose with a nozzle on it when you're washing your car. When you shut off the nozzle after rinsing your car the hose flexes up right? Same idea, only this time it's happening in a fuel system where the fuel injector is the nozzle. Every time an injector opens and closes it creaetes a pulse in the fuel system similar to the garden hose. The damper reduces/absorbs this shock loading. The less shock loading a system undergoes, the better.

How would you know when it's broken? Well that depends how it breaks. If it were an internal issue with the damper you would probably never know, even if you had a pressure guage hooked up to the fuel rail it would be hard to tell. In my case on my last car it was mounted inbetween the fuel pump and the sender, eventually the seals just got old and when you took a corner hard and the fuel pump moved it cause a leak and fuel pressure to drop. The car then died until it built up pressure again. This obviously isn't an issue on a neon as it's externallly mounted. You just came across about the only problem you could have with it.

[03blackrt]

But what is its purpose ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_hammer

[Guard1an]

heres the creepy thing when I took it off, it had one green oring and one yellow oring...... green last I checked was for AC, and yellow vition was for fuel WTF, oh well it doesn't leak now, and thats good enough for me . a water hammer, intresting, but I doubt we neons could ever see that kind of damage shown,


-Mike

[03blackrt]

Not only can it put unnecessary abuse on the fuel components by not having it, but it can also cause erratic fuel pressure (Making it harder for the computer to control the injectors.).


As stated above, it's not necessary, but it was put there for a reason.

[Guard1an]

well the chrysler dealer down south knew what I was talking about, he found it strange that there were 2 different colored orings, said both factory ones should have been yellow.... weird, but like I said its fixed now, hopefully no more problems...... but the annoying dash rattle is driving me nuts !!!


-Mike

[racer12306]

moving to engine

[Guard1an]

my bad Frank, should have posted here in the first place. Does anyone know why chrysler in its infinite wisdom put plastic line from the FPD to the fuel rail ?

-Mike