I am in Florida, no rust here either. I re-used my original straps and bolts with no problem. My tank had about 10 or 12 gallons of gas in it so it was heavy and hard to work with while lying on my garage floor under the truck. I had my truck up on jack stands, front and rear. Two things that did help to have on hand was my floor jack and ratcheting tie down straps. When I got the tank loosened I put a piece of plywood under it that was just about the same length and width as the tank. Then I ran the jack up until it contacted the wood in about the center and put the tie downs over the tank, wrapped them around the saddle of the jack and secured them under the wood, then lowered the tank down far enough to clear the frame and side of the cargo box and rolled the whole thing out in one motion.

I also got creative when I was raising the tank back into position after R&R'ing the pump. I remember lying on the garage floor on the left side of my truck, trying to figure out how to get the tank raised high enough to reconnect the lines and put the tank back in its place by myself. I looked across the floor and saw a few one gallon size metal paint cans under a shelf on the opposite side of my garage. That was when I got the bright idea to set the paint cans under the plywood on the bottom of the tank to support it while I put the straps back on. It turned out the cans were just the right height to support everything while I jacked the tank back into position.

Jimmy

 

Thanks for all of the advice. I will be on this project thursday and I'll post back a report.

 

Crawl under and look carefully. Notes I've read say that an extended cab you can pull the bed and access the tank, quad cap you can't. (I can't say, mine's a regular cab and besides it's a 1988).

Eyeball the tank straps carefully - those are prone to breakage, but then, I read that from rust belt vehicles. (That's one reason why I pulled the bed - eight bolts holding it to the frame, one to the ground wires, two connectors for the tail lights, and four screws around the filler neck, and me and my stepson or nephew could pick it right up.)

As Brink5 said, get a GOOD one. Don't cheap out. Don't overpay either ...

What I had to do, since the whole assembly is NLA for my truck, is replace the pump with a Bosch unit, the fuel sock with a new one, and I rebuilt the sending unit - all easy on my 1988, just a pain. (I also replaced ALL the rubber around the fuel pump, both inside and outside, plus the fuel filler neck grommet and the filler hose - but again, see note about being a 1988.)

RwP

 

Thanks. Alldata has me pull the tank, but I"ll take a look and see if I can pull the bed, that sounds a bit easier especially since i have a FULL tank!

 

Ok, so I replaced the Fuel pump today. First before I started I attempted to start truck and it actually started and ran fine. I decided to still go ahead with the install since I bought the new pump figured the pump itself was giving me the intermittent issues. After install, I started truck and everything ran great. Then, went to start truck again later and the same symptoms as before. There is definitley no power getting the pump when it does not work. I can't hear it humm when key is on position. I think there is a short somewhere. I replaced the fuel pump relay, still a no go. My battery terminals are clean and the battery is old, but in great condition aka it cranks very well so I don't think that is the issue. I also took my meter and took readings where the relay prongs insert. I got power to one while key is off and power to two when the key is in the on position which should be sending the signal to the pump.

I"m now trying to physicall inspect the electrical line that goes to the fuel pump. Maybe a rodent chewed through part or its integrity has been sacrificed in some way. Any other ideas? Frustrating!

 

I physically checked all of the wires to and from the pump and all are in good shape. Maybe a loose wire at the harness?

 

I'd say it's time to grab the wiring diagrams in the factory service manual and start chasing.

I'd first see if the ASD relay gets a pulse for about 2 seconds on key-on.

I'd also check the fuel pump relay the same way.

(And if your truck doesn't have the Auto Shut Down relay, don't bother checking it *grins* )

Then you can check downstream.

I'd also lay a weather eye on the ignition switch (the switch portion, not the keylock portion).

RwP

 

What was the fuel pressure when the truck was running? If the fuel pressure was OK then you are probably on the right track with trying to locate an electrical problem. Do you have any codes stored? You can do the key dance, which is turn the key from off to on, off to on, off again and back to on and leave it in the on position. Any codes will show up in the odometer window. The problem is that you may not always get a code with an electrical fault.

It is hard to say for sure but I wonder if your 4.7 has an Auto Shutdown Relay, and if it does, maybe that could be the problem. ASD would be located in the PDC and may be labeled "O2 Relay". The ASD relay supplies power to the fuel injectors, ignition coil and oxygen sensors. It gets energized with a ground input on terminal 85 from the PCM. If the relay is defective the truck won't get fuel to the injectors nor will the other parts receive voltage and the truck won't start. You should also get a check engine code from the PCM when and if the relay is bad. It might have code P1388 or P1389 for ASD problem.

The ASD relay will also shut down if there is a problem with or a defective signal from the crankshaft position sensor. You may get code P0219 or P0320 or P0387 if the CPS is defective. I know when my crankshaft sensor went bad last year my truck would shut off and not restart at all until it had sat for a while and cooled off. The problem there is the crank sensor may not always set a code. My truck shut off while I was driving on two separate occasions before it threw a code on the third time it shut down. The code I got was kind of unrelated but it was for low voltage to the MAP sensor. The problem turned out to be the crankshaft sensor was bad and interrupting the 5 volt signal on my pci bus so it probably caused a power interruption at the ASD relay and a lot of other sensors too.

I know very little about a 4.7 and have no idea if this might be your problem but it may be worth checking out.

Jimmy

Edit: Ralph beat me to it but it would be worth checking the ASD.

 

No ASD on the truck

Checked fuel pump relay again and everything working fine. I toggled the key to run and back to off position many times to see if I could get the symptoms to display again but the fuel pump kicked on every time.

New symptom, now the truck isn't starting with the fuel pump running. If I give it some gas the engine will start and I can keep it running, but as soon as I take my foot off the pedal it dies. Now the emissions control light is on.

Around 30K miles ago my stock PCM went bad and I bought a rebuild online with a lifetime warranty. I wonder if this is failing causing strange issues.

 

The fuel pressure was around 48psi. This morning the truck runs fine. I get no codes when I did the truck it says P done. I guess I"m stuck playing the waiting game until it doesn't start. At that point I will check the ASD now that I know it is labeled 02 sensor, and also try to get a code.

Is there any chance it could be the battery? It does crank fine and have no symptoms of a low battery but it is old, now that I thin of it at least 8 years. I have read this could be an issue elsewhere.