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Oct 16, 2006 | 12:45 PM

bdunegan

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rusty

does anyone know of a good way to clean rust scale out of gas tank? mine is in-cab tank, and truck has been setting before i got it. can drive about 30 miles, and have to change fuel filter. also has anyone used any of the pour in tank liner before, and just how does it work?

Oct 16, 2006 | 02:43 PM

jowilker

Fleet Owner

Joined: Jun 1999

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From: Creedmoor, North Carolina

BD, Have you tried taking the tank out and pouring the contents out of the filler? I did that when I had paint flakes from when the cab was painted on the inside of the filler, and the po was scraping it off when inserting the pump nossle. I removed the tank and poured out the gas, put a little more in sloshed it around and poured that out.

That did the trick for me. Haven't had another problem with it in about 5 years now.

John

Oct 16, 2006 | 04:01 PM

bdunegan

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rusty

thanks jowilker for your reply. yes, i have had the tank out, and rinsed out what i could. keep in mind, this has been setting for years, so it has lots of rust. had some small pinholes near the top that i patched. still has a lot of rust in it coming loose because everytime i change filter, gasoline is brown rusty color, and first time i changed it, filter looked like you dipped it in mud. gets a little better each time, but thought if anyone had good luck with the pour in liner, i would give it a try. also have not tried the nuts and bolts or chain trick yet to loosen up part of it, but maybe that will be my next project. want to stay with as much originality as possible as it only has 39000 documented miles!!!

Oct 16, 2006 | 07:16 PM

TigerDan

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From: The hills of No. Calif.

You may be better off to try to find another tank if yours is rusty enough that it has pinholes, but if you're adamant about keeping that one, you could pour some muriatic acid in it (available at just about any hardware store) and carefully slosh it around, then pour it back out, rinse the tank out with water and blow it out to dry it. Then you could use the pour-in tank liner on it. Be sure to wear rubber gloves, eye protection and breathing mask while working with muriatic acid, it's potent stuff! I've used it to clean out rusty oil pans and valve covers, and it does a good job. Needs some time to work with heavier rust deposits though, and you can count on finding more pinholes as it removes material.

Oct 16, 2006 | 08:00 PM

"Beemer Nut"

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From: "Islander"

Pore in about 2 pounds of BB's, have a helper as you spend 10 minutes shaking the snot out of it and your arms then then flush out clean. I have had great results with that white liquid sealer on special can't replace rare motorcycle tanks.
BTW my radiator friend who has been in the business over 60 years has always told me to never use water to flush out as fuel tank, paint thinner vs gas to reduce having the "big bang".

Hey Dan, how's my lathe doing, you get it set up and running?

Last edited by "Beemer Nut"; Oct 16, 2006 at 08:11 PM.

Oct 16, 2006 | 08:32 PM

TigerDan

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From: The hills of No. Calif.

Hey Carl...no, it just sits. Don't have any place for it to be just yet, but I dug the footings for a slab for a shop at work today. The shop is already complete, just sitting there next to where I dug the footings, as soon as the slab is in we'll drag the building up onto it and I'll have a shop for the winter, then I'll get that lathe going. I guess you'll have to come up and help me get it set up, huh?!

We now return this hijacked thread to it's regularly scheduled topic...

As for the water in the fuel tank, my suggestion there was for washing out the muriatic acid. Might not be a good idea to wash it out with paint thinner or gas, but I'm no chemist so I don't know how they'd react. I've been thinking about cleaning out my Land Rover tank the same way, it's got rust and water in it from sitting wirhout the gas cap after someone tried to siphon me.

Oct 16, 2006 | 10:26 PM

"Beemer Nut"

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From: "Islander"

As long as a Land Rover leaks oil you'll never make a U Boat out of one as water will leak in and oil out for the enemy to see. My radiator friend freaked out when I was thinking about adding BB's to clean out the saddle tanks when I was thinking a water flush, big no, no with water flush.
Paint thinner was his answer. If a inside coating is to be used which is acetone based, flush with acetone first before coating.
All outside work is wrapping up for the winter down in my area. Wife and kids haven't been to Clear Lake, some time in the warm future we'll have to take a road (Rover) trip to see a Sunbeam.