H2 Struggles Starting
 

Over the last few weeks my H2 is getting worse at starting.

Battery seems strong and engine turns over strongly, and once started it will start again no problem. Give it half an hour and it will struggle again.

It could be plugs/electrical or mixture to lean/rich or injectors but just guessing really. Hopefully its not compression related but again could be.

So my question is has anyone had similar issues or can suggest where to start looking?

Any help much appreciated...

You need to have your fuel pressure checked. I would lean towards a weak fuel pump.

Thanks for that ... ill check it out..

It's a GM with a V8. Usually fuel pump and don't bother with a cheapo pump.

Thanks again for the comments.

Is this any easy job?

Ebay has this one, would this be OK?

The AC delco pump is a good one. You need to drop the fuel tank to replace it. Not too hard of a job.

Yep good advise. Stick with an original AC Delco. Like Phil said, not too hard a job but not fun by any means and not something you want to have to do again in a year or two because you get a better price on an aftermarket one. The factory AC Delco one lasted this many years which is a perfect reason to replace it with the same.

Just did the one on my GMC Sierra 5.3. After owning it for 16 years that truck has never once left me stranded until a few weeks ago. Fortunately it died in my driveway. Worked fine the day before coming home, next morning dead. I'd have preferred to replace the pump at my shop. Tried beating on the tank with a mallet while cranking in hopes that it get it spinning to at least be able to drive it (that actually frequently works on a failing fuel pump) but no go. Had to replace it in my driveway, on a hill. On a pickup the easiest way is to unbolt the bed and tilt the bed up. Did it by myself in about an hour.

I'd strongly suggest not trying this if your tank is full..... lol. If it is you will need a transmission jack for the weight of the tank. If it will still run then keep using it until you are getting pretty low on gas. Gas is heavy. Also if you have not done it in a long time, now would be as good a time as any to go ahead and replace the fuel filter while you are at it...

Appreciate all the helpful posts, will update the forum when completed.

Thanks again!

So investigating further, it would seem a wise move to check the fuel pressure first. This looks fairly easy and starightforward to do, is this correct?

Also is it worth getting a scan tool or should I say is there a resonably priced scan tool available like a GM Tech2 or similar that works with a Hummer? Of course I have a Bluetooth ELM which works well with Torque and is fine for checking & clearing fault codes but I'm trying to go up a level. Any thoughts?

On the scan tools I'm not sure of any that can do all of the things a Tech2 can. There are multiple other computer modules that as far as I'm aware only a Tech2 can see and talk to.

It just so happens that I literally just got a Tech2 clone in yesterday. I've always wanted one because they make a LOT of things a lot easier to troubleshoot, fix, calibrate, etc when you are a DIY'er like myself. I was pretty excited so I went out to the H2 last night and plugged it up just to see some of things you can do with it just using the Tech2 by itself. Also with TIS2000 on a computer (also fairly easy to get - the Tech2 I bought came with that and the security dongle) you can do full security and programming on any of the computer modules as well.

With the tool by itself I was rolling individual windows up/down, messing with the gauges, checking for codes that my bluetooth dongle with Torque pro cannot see, etc. Pretty neat but also pretty pricey. On the Tech2, used with TIS2000 you can for example, tell it you are swapping the BCM (not really) but you will be prompted to enter the VIN and then all of the RPO codes. By doing this you can omit RPO codes or add ones yours did not come with, etc to add or remove certain features.

I tried ordering one from sicotool on Aliexpress. Fail, over a month and they never did even ship it and it was supposed to have 5-7 day DHL shipping. So after lookign some more I went with China OBD diagnostic online supplier
I wanted on with the full storage case and all and was willing to pay a little more for that. I also wanted some sort of quicker shipping and I also wanted TIS2000 with a dongle. That site fit the bill and actually ended up less than the one I tried to get on Aliexpress. You can find ones without the case and TIS2000 for about $250 or so on Aliexpress. The one with everything from chinacardiags right now is $319 with free very fast DHL shipping. It was about 3 days after I ordered when I got the shipping notice and 4 days after that when it got here. Very quick. Its also very well done - once you put the decals on its essentially indistinguishable from a real Tech2 and seems to work perfectly fine.

Now when one of the 4 blend door actuators gets stupid, I can re-calibrate it. I can now re-calibrate the sunroof. I can now re-calibrate the rear air suspension. I'm not aware of any other tool that you can do these things. There are so many tests and diagnostics in that that you can really narrow problems down with it. You also want to find a torrent or download for the GM eSI. Thats GM's service information system and is the full factory service guide for everything. The one I found runs as a virtual machine and covers up through 2008 models.