They need not cost so much but also mainly fail when the car is not used regularly.

 

 

Really? Not much. Keep a good amount of gas in the car. That helps them as they won't tend to try to suck do so much crap through the in tank filter, and the pumps actually are cooled by the gas. If a fuel tank is more full when stored, corrosion from moisture is lessened too; preventing less crap to work the pump hard. That all said, they eventually fail and you just have to replace them.

 

Replacing the in-tank fuel pump is a pretty difficult job. $800-$1,200 is par for the course. The OEM fuel pump is quite expensive in itself and decent aftermarket ones are around 300 bucks when I looked into it. From what I have been told they just fail without warning. I don't think you would want to replace it until it actually goes out.

 

Any low volume luxury marque car is liable to be expensive to fix/maintain if you don't DIY.

This forum can assist with the DIY...

 

It's something to understand as a weak point - that way you are looking at the pumps when any odd engine operation occurs. With the R having two -- can complicate things. You can test them. There are various aftermarket pumps available -- some surprisingly inexpensive. It's important to understand that some require modification of the mount and may also not have the same electrical plug -- there are work arounds for both.

Some pumps just fail, others must start to bind and the output becomes unstable ....one additional issue is the wire harness in the tank. Some pumps must start to pull more amps and this overheats the wire or the connector at the pump. With the amount of labor required I went with the OE pumps and internal filters - I had them on hand when my independent started the job .. the harness to each pump is about $100 and the local dealer had them in stock. In my case the the wires were fine. But, it's not something you will know ahead of time and may need to be addressed.

I was not going to get involved with my independent trying to modify the parts -- I many have looked at it differently had it been a Jaguar specialist with many under his belt and long term experience with given aftermarket part. I keep my cars -- so this was not a get it back on the road for a year fix.