Leaking petrol

[fdaniels]

I decided to gift my girl friend with a full tank of petrol but to my horror the tank started overflowing when it got close to full. The tank seemed to top out at 3/4. Now I can understand why the petrol never lasts in her car! The tank is now at about 1/4 and we only drove 80 - 100 km.

How do I fix it, and will it be very expensive? Also the car had an idling problem for about 1 year. GM couldn't figure out why. We spent a lot of money trying to fix it. It started when the computer box was replaced. Fsck you GM!! The car runs very strange when it can't idle - the oscillations have high peaks and low frequency. When I rev the engine enough, it feels like the petrol can 'flow' again. The only way to make it idle is by driving it HARD in 1st and 2nd.

The strange thing is that it doesn't always have the idling problem. Sometimes it has its good days. Another fact, the idling problem seems to return when I throw in petrol.

Any thoughts on these 2 problems?

 

[etwylite]

Fuel pump? pressure regulator not consistent?

Please describe exactly what happened when fuel "overflowed" on filling, and how you know it was only 3/4 full.

 

[fdaniels]

Well, the car was empty when I went to fill it. I told the petrol attendant to fill it up. He put in the hose and started washing the windows. At this time I started checking each tire's pressure. In the mean while the car had filled up (the hose automatically stopped). I am 90% sure that at this point it will still not overflowing. It seemed to me that when he tried to force more petrol in it started overflowing. I was kneeling next to the back wheel when I heard the petrol running. I looked underneath the and noticed a strong flow of petrol flowing from the top of the tank. I shouted to the idiot to stop putting in petrol.

The receipts says that he put in 47 litres. The petrol gauge told me that the petrol tank was 3/4 full. Though, I have been suspecting for a while that it wasn't very accurate. It seems to linger around 50% a little longer than I would expect.

 

[ABCpt]

Well, how big is the fuel tank, or what car is it. When you overfill the tank, the fuel will overflow.

 

[upup]

Had the same problem. was a thread here somewhere.
filler pipe were degraded. replace and there you go. Mine only started to leak at home, you smell petrol and later on the floor.
R100 for pipe.
2 liter coke for maccie.

 

[Gnome]

It's the fuel breather pipe. Need a new hose (from Auto store), and 2 hose clamps. It sits at the back in the center of the car, black pipe in a black sleeve. Should have holes in it if it's leaking that bad. Break off the old clamps using some pliers (it'll be some sh#tty GM non-reusable clamps). Then pull off the hose and replace it with the new pipe + proper hose clamps (those that tighten with a Philips or flat head screw driver)

Have you ever noticed that when they fill up the pump clicks and then stops filling up at which point they start rocking your car and whatever to get more fuel in? Well the fuel tank was actually fully but by rocking it and filling up further the fuel goes and sits in the breather hose. It's there to allow the car to fill up fuel faster by allowing fumes and air to escape back up the filler cap. Now what's happening is you are filling it up with fuel, causing it to parish as it was actually not intended for that purpose, it's retarded of them to not make it of better quality but I've noticed the old pipe was still some NON-GM part used by Delta, now that GM has taken over they are using a proper GM made pipe, so I can only surmise that the problem is inferior quality product was used because it is a purely SA phenomenon on the Corsa.

So the simple solution is to replace the pipe with an ACTUAL fuel pipe since that is what you are using it for anyway (to store fuel instead of just allow air to escape), the pipe should be of the same width but it may need to be a tad longer as the original hose is stretchy or you can buy another from GM, ironically the GM original costs more than a fuel pipe from auto store. It has nothing to do with your loss of performance tho.

The loss of performance may be because the car hasn't been serviced properly. Replace the fuel filter. But your details on the performance loss are very iffy so post some more details and I may be able to help you.

 

[fdaniels]

Shot, thanks guys! I am going to check that out this weekend. For those wondering, she has an Open Corsa Lite. I should have noticed that something was up because I have been smelling fumes for a while but always assumed that it was other cars' exhaust fumes. Now I've realized that it's actually the smell of petrol! I'll replace the fuel filter and the hose, hopefully that will sort her car out.

I reckon the other problem is too hectic to diagnose over the internet. Her car is pretty messed up :wtf:

Her car sometimes can't idle. This occurs either when the car has been standing for a hour or more, or when I fill up with petrol. This doesn't always happen. Sometimes it will just work. When it can't idle the following is true. The engine revs weakly, almost like the petrol is flowing slowly. The engine sounds muffled. Her car doesn't have a rev counter so I can't give actual numbers. When I rev hard, you can hear a distinct change of frequency (maybe rpm?) as the engine starts to rev properly.

They changed the fuel relay or something but that didn't help. I was wondering if sediments in the petrol tank can cause this.

 

[ponder]

Your posts really do not make a lot of sense. Take it to a mac.

 

[Gnome]

@fdaniels: The car really isn't in such a bad way as you think. It's probably either a loss of spark on one of the cylinder banks (car uses a wasted spark configuration) or a fueling problem. Unfortunately you don't seem to be too much of mechanic (no offense), so best take it to a person if it persists, but make sure it happens there so they can see it. It's impossible to help someone if you can't see the problem.

That is why GM are the worst people to take a car to if the problem is intermittent, they only have a few minutes to spend on your car, if they don't experience the problem for themselves they read what your complaint says and replaces what they think is the most likely component to cause trouble. Worst yet, GM only help people on appointment, you can't rock up there with the problem happening, you have to book in the car, then they'll look at it, at a time of their choosing, pointless.

 

[fdaniels]

Yeah, I will definitely take it to a mechanic It is really tough trying to explain the noises that an engine makes via a forum. Hehe. Thanks for the pointers though, I REALLY appreciate it.