I can hear a high pitch whine from the rear of my car, not audible when inside or driving but can be heard if I open the drivers door while seated. On investigation the sound it appears to be coming from the fuel tank so must be the fuel pump. I am assuming that a good pump would be almost silent? .
The car had been pinging (knocking) a bit on light acceleration, I put higher octane fuel in it which seems to have helped, I am wondering if a weak fuel pump could cause engine pinging due to running lean? 2 days ago I also had a hard start where I had to crank the engine multiple times to get it started, but that has only happened that one time. On hard acceleration the engine seems to surge a bit and doesn't accelerate smoothly.
Should I go ahead and replace the fuel pump? or could it be something else?

 

I agree that there is nothing in the rear of the car that would make a whining noise other than the fuel pump. You could go ahead and replace the fuel pump and see if that fixes all of your problems. Or you could pull out the fuse for the fuel pump and see if that stops the whining noise before you replace the fuel pump. You could also check the fuel pressure in the line to see if the fuel pump is pumping the correct amount of fuel. Your starting problems may not be fuel related.

 

codes? i would lean on maybe an evap issue, i have similar noise and the evap purge solenoid is getting replaced b4 i replace the pump. i still think my pump is almost gone, fuel filter might be clogged as well.

 

Keep in mind that the original poster lives in
New Zealand. The shipping cost needs to be factored in to the price.

 

HAHAHAHAHA. Damn didnt even see that. Never mind. Delete post

 

Thanks for the replies. I changed the fuel pump today with an aftermarket pump from a local car parts retailer, cost me $200 (NZ) the brand name is "fuelmiser" not sure if you have that brand in the USA, hopefully it will have a reasonable service life. It came with its own filter sock but I used the old one because the stump tube on the new sock was shorter and wouldn't have reached quite to the bottom of the tank, the old filter sock was larger as well which has to be a good thing for fuel flow?. The small circlip that connects the sock filter was a bit of a pain to get off but that was the only thing that gave me any trouble, other than trying to find which fuse was for the fuel pump, being an import vehicle it was all written in Japanese!
A youtube video on how to replace the fuel pump was a great help, I think the guy that made the video was on these forums at some stage in the past, his youtube videos have been of huge help to me.
So I got the pump done then late in the afternoon I decided to replace both rear struts, big mistake! I ended up finishing the last one at 11:30pm under torch light haha, but again thanks to the youtube videos I was confident in doing it and it went ok. The only issue was I broke off the end of the old strut piston (flat bit on the end) so I had to get some vicegrips and clamp on the piston to get the nut off. I swapped over the springs and the strut mounts seemed to be in good condition so I was confident in reusing them. The paper gaskets had disintegrated though, so i made my own out of some rubber bicycle inner tubes, just cut the tube open and cut holes for the mount bolts, put a bit of rubber grease on them and stuck them on. They went on ok but I have no idea whether that is a viable replacement for the paper gaskets (why are they made of paper?)
The old struts were absolutely stuffed, I compressed one by hand and oil squirted out everywhere and the other one had no compression at all, it was just completely loose, could move it up and down with two fingers.
So I've just taken the car for a late night test drive and the car has been transformed, amazing difference in ride and handling, the back end had been skipping out a bit and now it seems a lot firmer on the road and there is no shudder from the back end anymore. The fuel pump is quieter now and acceleration seems to be a lot smoother, so I'll put this down as a success, I'll see how it goes this week but so far I am feeling quite happy with the days (plus half the night) work.

 

Haha, thanks for the offer mate, but I think the freight would have been a killer. I've been to the USA twice and it's a loooong way from home.

 

You might want to consider replacing the front struts now. They probably have not been replaced either or replaced so long ago that they are worn out.