How sensitive is the pump to running out of fuel?

Everybody seems to think my problem is bad gas. my plan was to let the truck idle itself out of gas, replace the fuel filter, and fill with 5 gallons of good gas. will running the truck out of gas harm the fuel pump? i know if you ran out of gas in a ford explorer it would likely burn up the pump and not want to start again.

 

If you are low why not just siphon the rest out?

 

im not terribly low, i have just under a half tank, about 5 gallons i estimate

 

idling on 5 gallons of gas I can't imagine how long that will take.

I'd personally siphon it out.

 

Honestly it's probably not going to hurt it to do it once or twice but the effort of siphoning will ensure no damage.

 

I ran my pickup out ONCE. It's got the mechanical fuel pump though. I did it to see exactly how far I could drive it after the FUEL lite came on steady. 13 miles city is what I got. I've never run the 4Runner below a quarter (on the gauge, for what that's worth...), since it has the in-tank electric pump.

It really IS a bad idea to run the tank dry, especially just idling, as the pump is cooled by the fuel, and sitting there idling with the fuel getting low, it would get pretty hot. Good chance for it to burn out.

I'm goin to cast my vote for siphoning too. It would be a MUCH safer way to empty the tank. Absolute worst case, drop the tank, and dump the fuel out. You can look inside, with a flashlite, NOT a match, ahem , and SEE if there is contamination in there. Whether dirt, water, whatever, and get rid of it. If there ISN'T, you can put the gas back in, thus saving yourself the cost of 5 gallons.
If there IS dirt, you can probably get about 80-90% of it out by straining it a ladies nylon.They're actually a pretty good filter medium. Double or triple them over, and you have a super tight filter medium.

Good luck, no matter what you do!
Pat☺

 

You do not need to run it totally out just drive it till your REALLY low like hovering on E then go fill up with super or whatever you were going to put in. The amount of a total fill compared to what you will have left in the tank isn't worth talking about.

 

good advice as idling it for 8 hours only brought it from 1/3 of a tank to 1/4 of a tank. it would probably have to idle for 24 hours, at least, to burn through all its gas.

it was running really good though before i shut it off. it wasnt missing at all!

 

it wont drive, it misses and sputters when giving it throttle. it will idle fine once warmed up but is a bitch to keep running when cold. my plan is to move it into my garage and open up the access panel underneith the seat and take a look into the tank. i was having this problem with less severity on the last tank and i filled my 14.4 gallon tank with 12.9 gallons of shell gas so im skeptical that its really bad gas...im just running low on ideas. maybe i have a bad tank, well see once i can get in there

 

I'm a firm believer in running it low...add some Lucas stabilizer and ethanol neutralizer and of course being me...add 4 ounces per 10 gallon of Marvel Mystery oil...I know...snake oil shit but it works and works well...the Marvel oil will clean and lubricate every thing even the fuel pump and possibly reduce or eliminate some carbon deposits which these older engines are prone to...I have used both Lucas and Marvel in my 85 4 Runner and it runs Great...then fill it up

 

Additionally...put a screw into the vacuum hose on your EGR...crazy as it sounds it may fix everything...it did mine...

 

where my egr at? lots of vacuum lines under here

 

Sorry...my reply was only pictures...this is the EGR valve at the back of the intake manifold next to the fire wall...just unplug this hose and put a screw in it and I put a rubber cap over the actual EGR valve port...please let me know if this helps

 

excellent! ill try it. today when i put a fuel pressure gauge on it it was reading less than 1psi so i ordered a pump. im hoping it was just a pump

 

looks like we got the same truck, homie

 

It does...Great trucks that just keep on going!!!