Got crap in the fuel system, How far do I need to go? Options

[ellisor3]

I was driving yesterday and suddenly it sputtered and cut off. Would not restart. I thought maybe I was out of gas since my gauge was bouncing around. I wasn't far from home and got a gas can and added 2 gallons. Still would not start.

I drained the tank this morning and it had about 4 gallons in the tank. The gas from the tank looked ok. When I went to the filter at the engine and drained it, I got a nice shade of rusty brown and there was a lot of grit about the texture of sand. I drained all of the lines and will replace the filter.

How far should I go?
Do I need to clean the injectors as well?
Take off the fuel rails?
What about the fuel pump?

BTW, It is a 3.2

[skaufmann]

Kind of went through this.

-Pull the tank out, not too hard (you will need to replace the soft lines under tank). I assume since you have the filter in the back (like me) you have an earlier version with the pump behind the firewall. If so once you have center tunnel lines open on each end, blow air through the lines.
-Some will tell you to replace center lines with stainless. If you move pump to front you should replace with SS lines. If you leave in back not required since you're dealing only with negative pressure on supply and *neutral* pressure on return.
-Replace fuel filter (make sure filter is on supply line before the pump).
-Flush all loose material from tank. All tanks will have rust. What you should be most concerned about are *issues*. That's vague but you don't want to see areas that have more problems than others. If it's pretty consistent and tanks walls appear thick, you'll be fine letting it dry out and fill with gas again. Some will tell you to get taken care of at a radiator shop who will acid bath and seal the tank. This is true but not necessary if the tank only has normal rust. Again all original tanks have rust and work just fine.
-Reassemble everything and run pump without running engine which will *flush* the rest of the lines and get the new filter to catch any rust floating around. Another new filter could easily be installed after that. NOTE: you can get the pump to run by pulling the relay and bridging 2 of the connectors. I don't know which numbers just visually. (might be 30 and 78 but they are at 12 o-clock and 7 o-clock with 12 being front of the car)

-also, replace the sock filter in the tank on the supply line (bigger line).

Hope that helps.