My bulb has always been rock hard ever since i got the boat in 2003.Yammy 225 ran fine but when i stated it up it acted like it was gas starved.I squeezed the very now soft bulb and it ran fine.I think I may have to replace the entire fuel line.Am I a victim of eth gas??? I will have a PM soon and just change the fuel lines just in case.
The first thing I would change is the bulb, they are notorious for failing.
Capt. Larry Teuton
Cracker Built Custom Boats
Rule out any major stuff first. It may be the hose/bulb causing the problem, but the problem is a restriction in fuel flow somewhere. Start by with running an external tank and different fuel line (same conditions where the problem occurred), then go from there. I once spent almost a thousand nickle and dimeing when the problem was a fuel hose sloughing off on the inside and restricting the bulb outlet. The hose and bulb were as supple as the day bought … 
Might be the gas, might just be old rubber somewhere. Marine environment is pretty harsh!
I’m with Larry - the bulb is probably just getting old. BUT, if you can reasonably access everything, I think you’re right to just go ahead and replace the bulb and the rest of the line as well. Fuel hose is only a couple bucks a foot, bulb is $5-50 depending what brand you want, maybe a few bucks for hose clamps, and then as long as you get everything tightened back up there isn’t much that can go wrong from there. Cost me about $50 and a couple hours to replace all the rubber between my tank and motor and I consider it money and time well spent. Prevents a lot of potential problems for (hopefully) many years to come.
Oh, and of course if you haven’t already, check your filter(s).
Angler 204 FX
Yamaha 150
Heard that happens as one gets older. :} {sorry Joe, had to!
Russ B.
www.joinrfa.org
God is great, Beer is good, People are crazy
I really wanted to tell him, that they have little blue pills that make a fellow as old as Stono’s, bulb hard! You beat me to it, RussB!
PM coming up.Will change it all out.
Stonoman