Warm Weather Weekend Wrenching

"MM54" (mm54mk2) 01/22/2017 at 22:14 • Filed to: '71Chevelle

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Hello Oppo! Long time no post. Between travel for work and it generally being Really Cold, not much has happened worth sharing - until recently.

It was abnormally warm this weekend (60+ and sunny in NE Ohio in January?) which of course means I raked the leaves that accumulated in the front yard then got snowed on while I was on-site for work for two weeks in the fall.

Afterwards though it was wrenching time. The plan was to drain the Chevelle’s fuel tank, remove it, scrape off the old undercoating/rust above it, and POR15 the area. Removing the tank shouldn’t take much since I installed it in 2012.

Image via Home Depot but I got mine at Lowe’s

I recently picked up one of these things, which has a check ball on one end so you can start a siphon by moving it back and for as if you were... uh... using a shake weight. I looked forward to using it, and succeeded in getting about one gallon of gas out of the tank before the flow stopped. Figuring I just needed to go deeper in the tank, I tried for a couple minutes but couldn’t get a siphon to start. Removing the device revealed why.

The plastic end came apart, leaving half the housing and the ball somewhere in the gas tank. This wasn’t a break, it was glue that had come undone. The packaging strongly encourages the use of these for gas, too. They used to make these out of metal...

Moving forward I jacked up the back of the car and disconnected the fuel tank. Nothing crazy there, just some hose clamps and a bit of pulling to get it all free. Bonus gasoline sprinking when the feed line comes open!

Then the next difficulty arose (which I didn’t take pictures of) - one of the straps had, under tension, deformed around the head of the bolt securing it, preventing that bolt from turning. After an hour+ of cussing and in the end putting vice grips on the shank of the bolt (between the strap and the captive nut) I was able to get it turning (surprisingly). In my excitement, I turned it, and turned it, and turned it...

... and discovered that the “captive” nut had broken free from its captivity and sought to explore the world of Spinning. Now I’ve got one 9/16 wrench jammed up practically in the trunk and the other barely gripping the edges of the bolt’s head (no room for a socket with the bent strap). Eventually it gave way, I gashed my arm on the seam of the gas tank, and I was able to remove both straps, the latter 1/8 turn at a time.

This lead to the fact that there still was 10 gallons of gas in the tank, now balanced on my jack and very eager to slosh around, tip, and generally leak out all the lines I’d disconnected. It also turns out the new exhaust slightly obstructs getting the tank down.

30 minute task took 3 hours and was more difficult than removing the original 40-year-old tank was a few years ago (it leaked)

I then drained the 10 gallons of gas into a couple cans so it can be put back later. I wiped the dirt (literal dirt - at one point in storage some chickens took up residence underneath and got dust everywhere) off and set the tank to the side, at some point I’ll take the filler cap off and try to dump out the residual gas and broken siphon parts.

With much scraping and overall elbow grease, the bottom of the trunk (which is what’s above the tank) and inside edges of the frame rails were prepped for POR15. The area above the tank was in prety good shape - not undercoated except around the edges and mostly original paint. There was some rust near the braces and a few spots where it rusted through from the other side (all of these cars have leaky rear windows) which is an upcoming project.

This morning I donned some gloves and applied the coating, which is such a huge pain (mainly because it does not come off of you or anything else without sandpaper) but produces such nice results.

5-year-old smart phone + picture of black surface = potato quality. Yes there are some small holes.

Unfortunately you can’t see the frame rails in this picture, which look really nice too. I’ve ordered new hardware to put the tank back in (with washers under the head of the bolts this time...) but decided while under here for a combined 10 hours in the past two days that I should do the rear shocks and control arm bushings while the tank is out since it yields so much more room to work. Those were planned for this winter but I was going to hold off until later.

Next up is going to be wire brushing the trunk floor (again, I did it a few years ago but in storage it seems to have gotten quite damp at some point) to clean it up, putting POR15 in there (which should be way more pleasant since I won’t be working above myself), and patching up the pinholes with JB weld or seam sealer or some such hackery (hey you’ve got to pick your battles).

Oh dear, I’ve gone off rambling again haven’t I. Sorry.

Urambo Tauro > MM54 01/22/2017 at 22:27

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Neat! I’ve seen that siphon hose at the store, and thought it sounded interesting. But I always forgot to look up any reviews or videos of it by the time I got home.

Last time I needed to drain a tank, it slipped my mind again, and I made do with a hand pump instead. Next time I see one, I’ll go ahead and pick one up, but only if it has that metal valve.

TheHondaBro > MM54 01/22/2017 at 22:30

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Ah, I love a good WWWW.

thebigbossyboss > MM54 01/22/2017 at 23:23

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When I por’ed my cavalier I wondered how on earth I would get it off my hands so I could go to bed and not get paint all over my sheets. I tried washing and washing and washing and it would not come off. I basically had to wait for natural skin life to get it off.

functionoverfashion > MM54 01/23/2017 at 09:18

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On that tool - we had one at the marina where I worked, it was older and had a brass end and ball. It was fantastic, and we used it all the time. It was widely known as the Jerk-Off Tool.

MM54 > functionoverfashion 01/23/2017 at 17:53

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A friend of mine has an old copper/brass one and a newer plastic one he uses to put fuel into his airplane, says he’s never had a problem with the plastic one. I’ll be on the lookout for a metal one going forward, though. I still need to fish that plastic flare-shape and marble out of the gas tank...

That’s a very good name for it, though.

MM54 > thebigbossyboss 01/23/2017 at 17:56

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POR15 is one of the very very few things I’ll actually put on rubber (well, nitrile) gloves for. I keep a mirror (or use a chrome bumper, etc) nearby and a wet rag to occasionally check my face before it has time to dry if I’m working overhead with it.

I have gotten it off my hands with 220 grit sandpaper but the let-skin-do-its-thing is about the best option (unless you have to be at a customer site for work a couple days later, then you need to at least get the big spots off your wrists...)

MM54 > Urambo Tauro 01/23/2017 at 17:58

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Good plan! Let me know if you find somewhere that has them in metal valve, I’d like to pick another one up.

Keep in mind it may not work on a car with a modern filler neck; the one of the Chevelle is basically a 1.5" hole with about a 30 degree bend straight into the tank, it’s no issue getting a siphon going. Should still work to put gas into it, though.

Urambo Tauro > MM54 01/23/2017 at 19:09

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Ah, good point. I don’t have to do fluid transfers often, but it still seems like a cool thing to have around. I’ll make myself a note to let you know what I find.

Urambo Tauro > MM54 01/28/2017 at 20:22

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Well, I saw it again over at the local Home Depot, but I didn’t buy it (at least, not today). Once I saw it in person, the valve seemed awfully large, just as you warned. So I took a measurement and it’s about 7/8" in diameter. I’ll have to see what my filler neck will accept.

(TBH, I don’t even have a project at the moment that calls for this tool, but if I’m going to buy one just to have on-hand, I’d rather spend my money on something that I know can be used for draining my gas tank.)

It might interest you that this one did, in fact, have a metal valve with a glass marble inside. Based on your experience, and considering that the one on the Home Depot website claims to have a “safe plastic pump”, I’m starting to worry that they might be phasing these superior ones out. I might actually go buy it anyway whether it fits or not haha.

MM54 > Urambo Tauro 01/28/2017 at 20:42

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Ooh I may have to swing by Home Depot tomorrow and see if the local one has any metal-valve ones.