Here are pics of the fuel pump from the 99 Monty. The Sports have a longer pump assembly, so he just removed that flat bracket, cut some off, and then put it back together. Also, the Sport had much longer fuel lines coming out the top, which had to be cut with a small pipe cutter. (Dont have any pics of the new fuel pump that he modified).

 

Anyone know how tall the Montero Sport fuel tank is? Still need to remove the tank to install the new pump assembly and clean the tank.

With the truck on the ground, I have 9.5" clearance between the bottom of the tank and the driveway. Trying to figure out if my jack stands have enough height to make this work.

Also not sure how heavy the tank is. If heavy, will need added vertical clearance for a roll around floor jack.

Lastly, not real keen on being under truck if on jack stands at all 4 corners. Any problem doing this with only the rear raised?

 

Larry.....One thing I do is to place a couple old 6x6 blocks or a bunch of stacked 2x8s under the jack stands to bring them up higher. I also always leave the floor jack pumped up and pressurized on a rear part of the frame, and one on the front area (if I have the entire Montero way up in the air). I feel alot safer knowing the floor jack "has my back" if one of those jack stands decides to "pop goes the weasel". Another trick is to place a 6x6 block on the floor jack so it reaches high enough to support the frame.

Cant find any pics of me having the Montero high up in the air, but here is another ride with similar examples. I just dont trust those jack stands by themselves, and having the floor jacks as back-up gives me alot more assurance of surviving the adventure:



Not proud of this one, but the double 6x6 blocks on the rear floor jack were just applying some pressure and would hopfully hold the car if a floor jack decided to pulled a fast one. I was also pushing up on the axle for some reason with another floor jack:



Would you be able to just jack your Montero up on one side, and then would that make getting the tank out possible, and still have two wheels on the ground? Kinda like this:

 

Yes I have and do the timber cribbing under the jack stands as well as keeping the hydraulic floor jack in position and lightly tensioned as a safety.

I still want to know if I need 5 or 15 inches lift (or more?) for example. I’ve zero interest in starting to find out I can’t get safely to the end.

Somewhere I think I read that 10” lift was needed to jerk the tank. I’m sure that doesn’t include allowance for a jack under the tank.

 

Yea, I recall reading a thread in the past where someone mentioned how much room was needed to drop the tank, but I cant recall where that thread is. Maybe the drained tank will be light enough to ease down to the ground, or just have various size lengths of timber handy to prop under it, and lower a bit at a time.......or use the floor jack all the way down, and then replace it with 2x4s, and then jank out the 2x4s.

Do you have room to slide a tape measure up along the tank to get an idea how deep it is?

 

Yesterday put the truck on cribbing to replace the in tank fuel pump. The truck has stock size wheels and the bottom of the tank measured 9.5" to the driveway pavement. I raised the rear wheels about 9.5" via 6x6's and several plies of micro lam offcuts. Thus the bottom of the tank was about 19" above the pavement.

The prior video I linked for the fuel pump replacement was very good. Additional details are that the fuel filler tube protector in the wheel well is held in via plastic push pin type fasterners; remove the center plastic pin and then the "button" piece with prongs can be removed. I left the top most push pin in place and then rotated the cover like a pendulum out of the way.

Access to the hoses thru the wheel well is pretty bad if you have large hands. Do you self a favor and buy about 4' of 1/4" fuel line and 12" of 5/8" fuel line before you start this. The only hoses that I salvaged were the high pressure line and the fuel filler hose.

The fuel tank drain plug is 12mm. Mine had an aluminum type washer for sealing, not fiber. Sorry no pictures

Once drained, I used a floor jack to support the tank as the 14mm nuts were removed; 2 at front and 2 at rear. I soaked them with PB Blaster and let them sit while the tank was draining. I lowered the tank down and rolled it so that the top faced the passenger side as this provided better access to the electrical connectors. Once the floor jack was fully down, I had to slide the tank off the jack and then slide the tank on the driveway. The tank is 15.5" tall.

With the tank removed, I sprayed PB Blaster on the 6 fuel pump mounting studs and nuts followed by wire wheeling of the exposed studs. I cleaned the surrounding area with brake clean. The nuts are 8 mm.

The Airtex E8439H pump appears to be a near identical clone of the original. It even includes a Mitsubishi MD322973 tank pressure sensor.

The sock on the removed pump showed some discoloration but was frankly much better looking than I expected. Tank interior was nice and bright with no rust evident. I dumped the residual fuel out, added clean fuel, sloshed it around, dumped it, rinse and repeat 3x. Very very little debris came out, only a fine blackish silt that was fully in solution that did not repeat with the 2nd and 3rd rinsing.

I replaced all of the hoses except the fuel filler hose and the high pressure hose.

Reinstalled all, and it fired right up. Will take it out for a test drive later today.

Hopefully I fixed something. I retained the old pump in the event someone suggests testing of it.

Edit - The removed fuel pump was the original with 194,697 miles on it and 20,822 miles since the rebuild of the engine.

 

I'm glad you got it running again Larry! Looks good and thanks for the pics!

 

Thanks Jeff!

My tank looked pristine compared to yours. There are internal baffles and a sump for the pickup which makes the cleaning shown by the video to be suspect. One is not wiping/scrubbing out the tank as shown. My arm got stuck about 4” short of my elbow.

Test drove it twice today without incident and included hot restarts.

As tank was empty, I added Techron by Chevron fuel system cleaner then filled tank. Maybe snake oil but I can say with certainty that I have $13 less in my pocket .

Crossing fingers....

 

Larry.......Great detailed information for the next guy to read before taking his tank out. Excellent pictures. Looked like the metal fuel lines on your old pump were pretty rusty, so it was time for a new one. Hopefully this solves the problems.

That new pump looks like a perfect match to the original OEM one you removed. Im glad you paid far less than some parts guys are asking ($800 and more) for the same thing.

 

Update on the Sport...

Daughter says the hot restart issue still recurs sometimes, so the fuel filter and fuel pump replacements may have been for naught.

Unfortunately, the engine has developed a major oil leak, to the tune of loosing 1 quart a week! Parking spot at the house makes the Exxon Valdez spill look like a drop in a bucket!

Crawled under the engine and sprayed all with brake clean and wiped all off so could try to discern where the oil leak is coming from. Oil is everywhere. With cleaned engine, started it up and let it idle. After a period of about 5-10 minutes I could see oil start to drip from the bottom of the crank area where the plastic timing belt cover fits. From there it continues to drip down the pan and then to the ground. I assume as the vehicle is driven, air flow from the fan and vehicle movement disperses it everywhere including on the passenger side catalytic converter where it burns off creating unpleasant odor.

Prior to cleaning I was surprised to see oil gunk where the cam sensor grommet is located on the drivers side timing cover. Was hoping it would be as simple as a leaking oil filter but no.

Not good. Pondering next moves and have stopped driving it as I don't want to run it low on oil and have another bearing failure. Thinking it is - crank seal, cam seals, or apparently the timing belt tensioner bolts are supposed to be sealed which I know I did not do during the engine rebuild.

Very odd this came out of nowhere. This is first oil change with synthetic.

Marked up pictures showing the areas of concern. Pictures are from my engine build.

Never ends. Wife says time to get rid of it.....