fuel pump problem?

98 Accord coupe EX V6 120,000 miles auto.
Went out to lunch yesterday and the car would not start.
Turned over strong but not firing..
Called AAA, he banged on the gas tank and it started. ran for a few minutes
and I shut it off. it would not start again.
Towed to garage .
The next day the car started everytime they tried it.
They told me about $500 for a fuel pump installed.
I'm going to wait and see what happens.
I picked the car up and I'll make sure I have my cellphone at all times.

Any Ideas what might cause this?
It was HOT, in the 90s, The car had sit for 11 days and was 1st day back to
work after vacation.



If I find I do need to replace the fuel pump do I have to drop the tank? or
is there a removable penel in the trunk or under the seat?

TIA

Steve

 

check the main relay. tegger.com faq's.

 

==========================
When the main relay starts to fail, it prevents the fuel pump from
priming the engine when you turn the key to position II. Turn off you
radio and LISTEN when you get in your car. Listen to the fuel pump run
for two seconds. If you don't hear it, your car isn't going to start
unless you smack the dash with your left fist (and the relay runs) then
it will start. This problem usually happens when the car gets HOT
inside. That's why it will start OK after you cool the car down, or put
it in a shady place at the dealership.

Google 'honda main relay' and find a geek who can remove / resolder yours.

'Curly'

 

you'd think that garages would know about the Honda/Acura main relay by
now.....

 

c'mon dude, why sell a $50 repair when you can sell a $500 repair instead?

 

a $500 repair that would not have fixed his problem.

a garage still could make a good profit replacing his relay,charging their
hourly rate plus the part's "cost" + markup,AND have a happy,satisfied
customer.

I think it's more ignorance of auto repair than intentional parts-selling.

 

maybe, maybe not. but i wouldn't put money on them not over-selling.
it's absolutely rife in the industry. whole new braking systems after
only 15k miles? twice? master cylinder, disks, drums, calipers, hoses
[sic] the lot - that was a friend of mine at san francisco honda. he
asked me after the second time [about 45k miles] whether this was
normal...

 

Yup. I feel absolutely bad for people that have no knowledge of cars
when they have to bring them to a shop for service. You never know if
the place is selling you a bucket of lies unless you can physically
verify the problem, and know what you are looking at.

I once had a mechanic at a chain store try to sell me a brake job on
my 87 Camaro for front and back pads, shoes rotors and drums about a
month after I had replaced everything myself. Never went back there
again...

 

Something I heard from my mechanic is that he's seen fuel pumps on older
cars going recently, and he thinks it's due to too much ethanol in the gas.
He tested the gas in some of the cars with bad pumps and found 19% ethanol
which he says is too much for our cars to handle. Apparently un-ethanol'd
gas puts a lubricating varnish on the fuel pump, over time, and too much
ethanol eats that away, screwing up the pump.

Don't know how true that all may be, but he thinks the "cheaper"
(non-branded?) gas may have that problem which may also result in poorer
performance. I thought ethanol was a pretty expensive additive, but these
days it may be cheaper than the petrol.

Anyway, FWIW.

 

"He tested the gas in some of the cars with bad pumps and found 19%
ethanol"??? so your mechanic moonlights as an analytic chemist??

"lubricating varnish"???

no dude, this is just guessing bullshit.