[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
I've not done one of the tanks on my Dubs, but I've done a number of Vespa, Lambretta, and Puch scooter tanks; I believe we use the same process as the Radiator shops: "boiling the tank." We do it Old School.Does anyone have any experiences (good or bad) with cleaning and/or sealing a gas tank? I don't think the tank needs any repairs. My only experience was having a radiator shop perform this on my Truck (20 gallon tank) and it costing over $100.00. I understand there's cleaner/sealer sold for home use but would like to hear of experiences with this. Warning! Incredibly dangerous procedure about to be described! On the scooters, we remove the tank and plug the smallest opening (fuel line out) with a rubber stopper, or some other corrosion resistant plug. Then we *fill* the tank with muriatic acid (basically HCL gas in water) *IN A WELL VENTILATED SPACE* (preferably outdoors, and you will want to be upwind, believe me - muriatic acid is a nasty eye, throat, and lung irritant ), and loosely plug the remaining hole (fuel in). It has to be loosely plugged to allow any gasses produced during the rust removal to escape. Please wear clothes you don't mind being ruined, covering all your skin, wear rubber gloves, and safety glasses, and be prepared to wash off any acid that might splash onto you or anything else. Leave overnight (12 hours plus or minus) then *CAREFULLY* pour the used Muriatic acid back into the original containers (or some other plastic containers). You can wear the same clothes, gloves, safety glasses you used to pour it in, if they weren't ruined before. You can keep and re-use the muriatic acid on other tanks, or dispose of in your town next household hazardous waste collection. You DO NOT want to put this down the drain! Once the tank has been emptied of acid, then put a garden hose (hooked up to water, of course) in the the biggest hole - you can leave the other plugged. Turn the hose on full force and go away for about 10 minutes. Then pour out the water, put about one gallon of isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol in, plug the hole, and rinse the inside of the thank thoroughly with the alcohol. Pour the alcohol back into its container, and repeat with a fresh gallon of alcohol. This is to remove the water; you can save and reuse the alcohols for future tanks, just remember to use them in the same order, using the most contaminated alcohol (the first gallon) first, then the least contaminated one second. Then repeat this same procedure with two one gallon mixtures of gas/oil (roughly 1:1). This removes the alcohol and leaves a thin coating of gas/oil. If you do not do this, the tank will flash rust about a half hour after you rinse the acid out. On the scooters (which are two stroke) we follow the gas/oil mix with a pure oil "rinse" to really, really coat the inside of the tank. Or POR sells a kit: http://www.por15.com/bSPECIAL-Quart-of-Fuel-Tank-Sealer-Quart-of-Metal-Ready-b?sc=2&category=18 --
Robin |
_______________________________________________ vintagvw site list [email protected] http://lists.sjsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/vintagvw
