A few weeks back I asked here about a slow fuel gauge. It was slow to register new fuel that I put in. Someone replied that it might be a slow float. That made sense.
Now I have a new problem, the car won't start. I was low on fuel and stopped to gas up (the light never came on). The car refused to start right there at the gas station and still won't start now that I have it towed home.

I suppose that if the float was slow going up, it could be slow going down, too. Maybe I was lower on fuel that I thought. But the car ran fine up until the moment that I decided to pull over at the station and gas up.

So, any advice? I plan to start going through the fuel delivery components one by one tomorrow. With a full tank of gas, I might add.

 

After a half day of thought...

I will check that filter. But, if I did accidentally run the car out of gas and very nearly saved myself at the gas station but missed it, then what happens if one runs it out of gas? Does the tank pump immediately burn out? Is that the source of my erratic gauge problems? Does anybody have a schematic?

Thanks.

 

Dave, it's not the end of the world to run an FI car out of gas. They don't instantly burn up. Still though, it's always best to keep a half tank or more in fuel; the gasoline aids in cooling the in-tank pump.I'd check the ground wire in the area of the fuel tank bung. On your car you really need to drop at least one end of the tank to get a good look. Combined with the "slow float" symptoms, I'd think you might very well have wiring issues.

 

http://www.stepbystepvolvo.com/NoStart.html

What do you make of this flowchart?

 

I think that my coil has gone bad. I took it to the parts dealer for a test and the primary is within specs but the secondary is over. The max on the secondary range is 9.0 and mine repeatedly comes up to 10.0. This issue may very well turn out to be electrical, after all.