Centurion Fuel Filter

[rob love]

There are currently 24v fuel pumps at princess auto in the surplus section for about $14.99 each. I believe they are salvaged from some larger piece of equipment, and appear to be brand new. With one of those and an inline check valve, it should be possible to set up a priming system for any 24 volt vehicle.



The pump is the same pump we used on multiple types of equipment back in my days in the military. I bought 3 or 4 for future use.



Just thought I would mention it in case it was of any use to those in Canada.

[Malcolm Towrie]

Good to know. I'll check it out.
Malcolm

[jdmcm]

Excellent suggestions all, appears we may have a bigger problem, I now have fuel on the carb side of the fuel pumps, but so far no start...not enough time at the moment to go further but hopefully next week can steal an afternoon to see what is up. Rick I have been hoping to try that steering trick but one small hurdle first...it has to run! Wondering if possibly we are having an electrical fault and no spark...Is there a test for the booster coil? Cant do a mag drop test from the drivers hole until she is running. Need to pull a sparkplug and check we have spark but currently not enough hands available. I have also read that a low coolant situation can trip the mags and ground them to prevent driving in that event...has anyone encountered this? I am going to grab one of those fuel pumps Rob suggested for future use. Would seem very odd if both mags quit at once would it not? Rick I will be in touch next week to get those parts from you and have them sent off to Carl's...almost brave enough to try sending the container back to Canada...almost

[Malcolm Towrie]

John, it takes a lot of pumps of the priming lever on whichever fuel pump is pumping to fill both carbs. When the carbs are full enough to close the float needles, you should feel the priming lever stroke doing less work.

You can test the booster coil by unscrewing the booster coil connection from the right hand mag and holding the end about 1/4" from a ground while pressing the starter button. (The booster coil only works while the starter button is pressed.) You should see lots of sparking.
But based on my experience, the booster coil provides very little assist to starting. I bought a NOS one and it bench tested ok. But when I cranked the engine with just the booster coil providing the spark, it just fired occasionally and came no where near starting. As soon as I put the mags in service, she fired right up. I figure I wasted $400.

On our Mk 5/2, there's no shutoff on low coolant. There's no level switch on the header tank, nor on the wiring diagram, and the only thing that grounds the mags and stops sparking is switching the ignition switch to off, or pressing the mag test buttons.

Malcolm

[jdmcm]

Well got the old girl fired up today and she is running better than ever! The new fuel filter has made a difference for sure. Took many, many primer strokes to get the fuel pushed up in to the carbs...hundreds before any resistance could be felt, and I hit the old kigass pump about ten times and then got the first sputter from the engine in 3 weeks...so back at it with the priming, and some accelerator pedal action and she is alive...hopefully next week I will get a chance to try the lever flick shift test...just happy that she's back running...unlike a Sherman, moving a dead Centurion is not for the faint of heart or stingy wallet.

1st Parade....CHECK FUEL!!!!!!!

[eddy8men]

really pleased she fired up for you. i remember it took an age for us to bleed the fuel system back up again once we'd run it dry.
all the stuff you wanted is ready to go, just give me the word and i'll drop it off at carl's place.

[Malcolm Towrie]

John,
Congratulations on getting the old girl running!
Sounds like the fuel pump you were using to prime is a bit dodgy. If it gets worse, check out the fit/gap between the check valves and the pump housing. I removed the check valves and messed around lapping the disk 25 onto the seat 27 to no avail. I could only get about 2" Hg vacuum to pull fuel. Then I realized the valve could leak between the seat 27 and the fuel pump body since there is no gasket. I'm used to seeing a gasket here on other vehicles. Using some Aviation Gasket goop to glue the seat to the body increased the suck to 5" Hg, a big improvement. Hope it lasts.

Malcolm

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[jdmcm]

Hi Malcolm, Rick

yes sir, I think we could benefit from a pair of new pumps or a rebuild, I remember on my FV432 that the fuel crossover/drain also had only one gasket where I felt it needed two...

Rick I will PM you on the parts, thank you

I am going to get the old girl in the shop at the end of the month for some interior work so pumps over the winter I think

John