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Hello everyone, I am new to this forum and have recently purchased an 82 e21 and have ran into some car issues. Driving home from work yesterday the engine sputtered to a halt on me. I was able to crank it and drive a few more miles before the same thing happened again. When I did it a third time it would drive only a few feet before shutting off on me and at this point I had it towed to my house. A couple days have passed since this occurence and i decided to try and start it and it ran fine. I didn't trust it take it very far but sitting under the garage helped and I was able to take it to the post office and back. In addition, to this the car has been making a ringing noise I think from the fuel pump and has a strong odor of gas. My questions could this be the fuel pump? And if so does anyone know how hard this part is to replace? Thanks

What model and year mate?

It is a 1982 BMW 320i with the 1.8L engine. do you have any clues?

Sorry to dig this up, but I'm having a similar problem. My car sat for a day without running, and now it has a very rough idle and it sounds like the engine almost dies when I accelerate quickly, even in neutral. I had started the car to get it to the garage so I could check on the fuel pump without being in wet grass, and from the driveway and it died before I could even make it. On closer inspection, my fuel pump relay seems to have been getting way too hot. I don't know if that's because the fuel pump is bad and is messing with it, or if it's just the relay thats failing.

Wow, no relay should heat up enough to heat up the plastic cover.
Never seen this before.

That would be my first suspect as well.