I've had my holley red electric pump for about 8 years. It never had any problems. I have the ground wire connected to a ring connector bolted to the passenger side of the shock crossmember where the fuel line clamp used to screw into. Over the weekend I noticed the screw was sloppy so I replaced it with a regular bolt, nut and star washer. Now at random it won't return to idle. It will stay at 2,000 rpm and have a -10 amp draw. I tried taking the bolt out and sanding the cross member down to bare metal and reattaching the bolt. It still does the same thing. I checked my throttle linkage and it doesn't appear to be sticking. The choke is off when it does this. Could the relief valve on the pump be sticking, or is it something electrical related?

The fuel pressure won't cause the high idle problem. In fact if the pump had a bad ground it would lose fuel pressure. I also have good luck with the red pump as I run one on my 63 and one on my sons Dart. But you may want to check for a vacum leak also for the high idle or the fast idle cam sticking. Ron

You know the same thing happen to me when I got a zit on my nose. Turns out they were not related.


I kind of doubt your one problem is related to the other unless maybe you changed something else at the same time.


Maybe a vacuum leak?

I didn't touch anything under the hood before it happened. I took the air cleaner off and made sure the chokes were off when it was doing that. Could the pump short it self, raise the fuel pressure, bypass the needle valves and raise the idle? There is no fuel pressure regulator. The ammeter discharges when the idle goes up so I think its fuel pump related.

Thanks for the suggestions Ron. I'll check the firewall ground and charging system.

When it was charging I unplugged the wires from the voltage regulator (70-up style) and it discharged but did not notice a drop in idle. I unplugged the ground from my fuel pump relay when it was discharging and it still discharged. I removed the paint from the firewall and head under the ground strap terminals and made sure the bolts were tight. When it was discharging the positive field wire had 12V. Both the positive and negative field wires had less than .3 ohms of resistance from the alternator terminals to the voltage regulator. I noticed the discharging usually starts at higher rpms when it is warm. I tightened the belts, but the problems remains. Any idea what else could cause a simultaneous increase in idle speed and discharge?

Edit: I ran the engine when it was starting to get dark. I can see arcing in the alternator when its charging. If I take it up to 2-3,000 rpm it will start discharging for a few minutes. There is no arcing in the alternator when it discharges.

Thanks HealthServices. I think the idle increase is most likely due to alternator not charging. But when the idle was normal (900rpm) and it was charging properly, why was I able to disconnect the voltage regulator harness without the idle speed increasing?

what is the rpm difference between idle before and after burnouts?

Thanks guys. My alternator is bad. One of the brushes came loose so I am just going to exchange it.