Fuel injection can be dangerous.

I just want to share this story with you guys to help emphasize the dangers of fuel leaks in high pressure fuel injection, and always carry a fire extinguisher with you.
I have another little hot rod car, its a turbo charged honda.

I was driving my car down the highway, I had just done a big 2nd gear and 3rd gear pull, lots of tire smoke, and spinning of the slicks. Once I got out of it I noticed my AFRs started to go really lean, like 19 to 1. The car started losing power, and the AFRS went off the chart.
I started to play with the throttle to see if this was just a weird issue.

Since I was on the highway, there wasn't any easy spot for me to pull over. I had to drive it about 1 mile to exit and get off the road.

I stop and pop the hood, the entire engine bay is covered in fuel- The turbo charger, the turbo manifold, I mean everything. The fuel was literally pouring out of the engine compartment. There was a huge puddle underneath it.

The fuel pressure regulator bolts backed out allowing a 450LPH pump to unload fuel through the loosened fitting. I think the only reason it didn't catch Fire was I am running E85... or I am just that dang lucky. The car had spent 7 hrs on a dyno and has driven hundreds of miles before this issue. NO idea why is loosened up. I did not have a fire extinguisher in the car had it caught on fire.


After filling the tank up and calculating how many miles I had driven, and how many MPGS i get I calculated I Pumped 5 gallons of fuel on my engine.

I now have a fire extinguisher. Be careful

Yikes, glad nothing bad happened!

That can happen to any combo really not just fuel injection. Most regulators are the same for EFI or Carb they just use a different spring.

sounds like more of a case of needing loctite. i had converter bolts back out on a project years ago. i used the blue. cleaned really good and went to red. didn't want them backing out again. there is a reason alot of aviation fuel connections are safetywired so they cant unscrew.

your very lucky. I've had engine fires; very scary!!!!!!!!!!

1. Yes you were very lucky
2. for sharing, but the common "It won't happened to me" still rules
3. Never gave much thought to the increase safety of E85, but I Think you are right
4, Any fuel leak is a serious issue, but at 40+lbs its way way worse.

My dad and I were 2 for 2 with having the Holley Volumax fuel regulator fail and allowing full psi/volume go to the carb. Mine happened going down the track.... literally had fuel pulling from the back of the hood. Flooded the engine bad and luckily I shut it down. I was very lucky that day. My dads occurred in the tech line at a track. Turned the pump on prior to starting and could hear the pump run, but no psi. Luckily he smelled and saw it before trying to start. It’s the Holley 12-704 style. Holley replaced both of them for free. The original design the simply pressed a brass piece into the aluminum housing where the spring and ball are retained. It eventually just hammered out the disc allowing full flow (we both ran Holley 250gph pumps). I took apart one of the new ones and they basically did the same thing as we did to continue to race with his car that weekend..... drilled a couple holes and retained the brass disc in with screws. Worth taking a peek if you have one of these large port regulators.

My car will be fuel injected and I am going to be running steel line for the majority of it, but what is a quality connector that I can use? Does anyone make ones with safety wire as was mentioned earlier in this thread?

i wonder if the aeromotive brand regulators have the same problem ?

Dude, God was looking out for you
Thanks to him for no fire

I hope not as my fuel pump, filters and regulator are all now Aeromotive.