88 Scorpio

[my8950]

So, my Dad has been interested to find a Scorpio for a few years. January of 2023 he went to Ohio to get a car before it being scrapped, a guy had owned it for most of its years, but ended up putting it in the garage after he finished school, then just left it and went on with life. That one needed a lot of work, still does, although its running now and all sorts of new stuff that my Dad has replaced.

This year, a guy contacted me about the Merkur owners list, asking if I had any contacts who would be interested in it. I sent to my Dad, he contacted the guy, a few weeks ago went and got the car, traveled from Detroit to Oklahoma and brought it back. This one doesn't run either, but seems to have no rust, much cleaner. A few hours spent on it and seems like maybe just fuel pump is NFG, it runs if I continue to spray something combustible in the air intake, but stalls out. Replaced fuel filter, still no go, fuel pressure go to about 8psi of so at the regulator. We'll see what happens, car is clean, I am kind of interested to buff the paint out and see just how good I can make it shine.

[my8950]

Paint even is not bad, just a lot of tree crap that sat on it and needs to be cleaned off.

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[brokencase]

Looks great.

The Diamond White cars seem to have the paint that holds up the best. It's single stage and can be buffed out.

My first white Scorpio had the black pinstripe like that one. Be careful buffing around the pinstripe.

Li'l wheel painting and headlight buffing detail work and you'll be set.

I guess the big question after getting it running is "What the state of the transmission?"

How do the seats look?

[my8950]

Looks great.

The Diamond White cars seem to have the paint that holds up the best. It's single stage and can be buffed out.

My first white Scorpio had the black pinstripe like that one. Be careful buffing around the pinstripe.

Li'l wheel painting and headlight buffing detail work and you'll be set.

I guess the big question after getting it running is "What the state of the transmission?"

How do the seats look?

Seats are great, everything seems really good.
Apparently they, previous owner was monkeying around with window on pass front door, seat switches also removed, maybe the switches didn't work? I recall these switches being a big ask when I was parting out the Scorpio I had.
Rear seat recline works, overhead display works, temp sensor works, HVAC thing seems to work, sunroof opens, so...Yeah, we will see about the trans once we get the fuel situation handled.

[DPDISXR4Ti]

The rust-free body is the most important part. Everything else is just parts. I would also be guessing fuel pump at this point. Drop the tank and see what you're dealing with.

Speaking of fuel-related stuff, be mindful of the banjo fittings at the fuel filter. They tend to leak where the nylon line is crimped to the barbs on the banjo fittings. I have a thread about this in here somewhere.

[my8950]

The rust-free body is the most important part. Everything else is just parts. I would also be guessing fuel pump at this point. Drop the tank and see what you're dealing with.

Speaking of fuel-related stuff, be mindful of the banjo fittings at the fuel filter. They tend to leak where the nylon line is crimped to the barbs on the banjo fittings. I have a thread about this in here somewhere.

Yes, we learned most of that on the previous Scorpio that he got.
Ended up making new fuel lines, brake lines and an assortment of other stuff for it which was rotted or pinholed throughout.
Fuel filter swapped out, but still no pressure, so yes tank is on the way out.
Also did fuel pump on the previous car and ended up having to make a new basket and hose configuration due to it being all rotted in the tank. I guess the up side to this is, it has a plastic tank instead of the funky XR tank.

[Ed Lijewski]

Haven't needed to check FP on.my Scorpios yet...but on an XR I recently found that my older HF fuel pump pressure tester, and then later a new Ebay direct-China pressure tester, did not depress the Schrader Valve pintle even when the hose nut was securely fixed.

This puzzled me to no end. Years earlier I used the HF unit on the same car and got a reading in the 30s. Prior to this testing I installed both new pumps, and verified great flow from the disconnected hose to high pressure pump with EEC fp connector grounded. Also dropped tank again and installed new fp hose specifically rated for FP use. Same result in pressure tests.

Long story shorter, it seems that some testers don't fully depress the valve pintle. I verified this by unscrewing the XR pintle 2-3 turns and the unit did display a low reading.

I decided to try an Autozone loaner tester, and it produced a good reading. The AZ unit included a separate fitting to affix on the Schrader Valve identified for Ford units and then use the standard pressure hose fitting on that. That setup produced good pressure readings.

I recall that I Googled "testing FP on some Fords" and the search results confirmed what I describe above was experienced by others.

It may be that professional FP test units are designed to deal with this kind of situation. But you might consider exploring this first as a cause of single digit readings.

FWIW I'd also check/assure the FP fuse a d relay contacts are shiney clean.

YMMV

[brokencase]

I forgot the obvious question. What is the mileage reading? Not that the mileage reading means very much given the fact that the odometer could be broken.

Ed has a good point - check fuel pump relay contacts and fuse before proceeding with pump change.

Make sure the inertial cutout switch has not tripped!

[my8950]

I forgot the obvious question. What is the mileage reading? Not that the mileage reading means very much given the fact that the odometer could be broken.

Ed has a good point - check fuel pump relay contacts and fuse before proceeding with pump change.

Make sure the inertial cutout switch has not tripped!

It's got about 90k on it I believe.

I will double check the schrader valve, as stated though, this gauge has been used on many applications and hasn't had issue, but, doesn't hurt/cost anything to try. When we key on, it does register up to about 8psi...When first installing, it was spraying all over the place because it wasn't tight enough, but yes, easy to check.

Not inertia switch and we can hear the pump come on when shorting the diag connector to run pump with key on. Basically, pump is running when it is supposed to, just not enough/correctly.

I located a pump tonight in my stash, so should be installed in the next day or two and see what happens.

[DPDISXR4Ti]

You could always do a test setup with an external pump. I have a couple '88 f-150 external Bosch pumps that I use for this purpose and all sorts of stuff. I used one to pump the sludge out of my heating oil tank before removal. They are super reliable - I've never been able to kill one despite the abuse.

[brokencase]

If it's been sitting a while then probably crude in the tank causing blockage.

Take pictures as you adapt/install new pump.

Anyway the car looks great. Hoping that your transmission works out OK and that there are no major issues.

[my8950]

Everything is pretty clean, I've never had the opportunity to have a car this old and this clean. Pretty crazy.

Original pump

[my8950]

Newer pump going in because I have it...
Yes it's overkill.

[Ed Lijewski]

I love/LOVE it when the stale old and easy predictions by lazy diagnosticians and their proscriptions (stale gas/crud in the tank pump/drop the tank) prove to be wrong.

YMMV

[brokencase]

I love/LOVE it when the stale old and easy predictions by lazy diagnosticians and their proscriptions (stale gas/crud in the tank pump/drop the tank) prove to be wrong.

What are you talking about? Is it not the case that the pump was not working and needed to be pulled out?