My Willys 3A and 3B Community
TECH FAQ SECTIONS => Engine compartment => Topic started by: Saskajeep on March 25, 2014, 01:31:59 PM
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I am classing this post as a fuel delivery issue
So I brought my Little Willy home last night and found I have a fuel issue. It starts, runs a few seconds then starves for fuel and dies. No big deal I will find the problem and fix it but it raises a question I am hoping someone will chime in on.
The PO said there was a lot of rust and crud in the gas tank so he rinsed it out with muriatic acid. However I still see quite a bit of crap showing up in the glass bowls. I know there are kits on the market to clean and seal old tanks but would like to know what you guys do to recondition your old tank. Any opinions?
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I took mine to a radiator shop that also works on fuel tanks. They flushed it and sealed it, and it seems to work fine, there is no debris in the filter bowl.
I've heard good things about this product also but i have not used it..Hirsch also offers complete flush/etch and seal kits...
http://www.hirschauto.com/prodinfo.asp?number=GTS
Is this on the jeep you bought in Boise?
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I took mine to a radiator shop that also works on fuel tanks. They flushed it and sealed it, and it seems to work fine, there is no debris in the filter bowl.
x2
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Ty and yes it is the one from Boise. Here are a couple of pics. When I get a chance I will take more and start a thread to keep you all posted on what I am doing with it.
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It looks good! From the ad I think it came with some nice accessories...the rear seat for one....
I'm sure one of the moderators can flip those pictures...
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Yea it is kind of hard standing on my head looking at them ;). Here is something you can do before sealing the tank. Get a magnet that you can place on a string. Place it in the tank and shake it around a lot. The rust will stick to the magnet. You can pull it out and have a some what clean tank. I know a guy that did this then threw a magnet into the tank and left it there to collect rust throughout the use.
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Here is what I do to my gas tanks: pull the tank out, remove the sender and drain plug after soaking it in acetone or reclaimed bodyshop thinner. This dissolves any gummed up gas. You can return the thinner to the bodyshop and they can re-claim it again. Sandblast it inside and out through all holes. If you find pinholes or leaks, I slightly indent them and then using a old bronze soldering hand iron, solder up the leaks. I then DA sand the solder like body filler. Then duct tape up the sender, filler, and install drain plug. Air up the tank to 2 lbs and spray soapy water on the repaired areas and seams to check for leaks. If all is good, paint it and you are good to go. I'm not impressed by tank creamers or sealers. Nothing sticks to rust for very long. A new CJ tank is really not too expensive, It's the military ones that are high. John
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While I have had good results with "liners" you still need to get most of the rust out for good results. A low tech method is just to put some clean gravel in it and shake, shake, shake. I don't think muriatic acid (dilute HCl) would have too much effect as lime isn't the problem and it isn't all that great dissolving metal.
A temporay fix can be to solder up a sock out of fine mesh (100 to 120) brass screen for the inlet. That keeps all the coarse stuff from plugging it and the fines that do get through settle in the fuel filter. I have used that a lot on old tractors.
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Thanks for the good ideas, both the magnet and the gravel are genius. as for the upside down pics, I don't get it. I posted them from my Ipad and even now after refreshing it they show up right but on my computer they are not. That's one for Pascal the techie to figure out!
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It is an IPAD bug, I've seen it in other forums.... Tried to flip them but unless I copy and put them in my Photobucket album, then edit and repost them I can't figure out how to flip them.. I've asked the other mods...
Bite the bullet and find a radiator shop for that gas tank.. The results will be well worth it...Unless the tank is spongy soft and rotted shouldn't be a bad deal at all. If there is substantial rot, or someone patched it already with fiberglass, toss it.
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And you might as well have the radiator shop check out your radiator....
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If you find a radiator shop to fix the tank, keep an eye on the price. A brand new one from Walcks is only $170.
I cleaned my tank several times (using either gravel or chains) over a period of two years and still had rust clogging up my fuel filter. The last straw was when I drove my jeep to work last fall and had the fuel filter stop up AGAIN! I finally bit the bullet and got a new tank from Walcks. I think I even got it on sale and had free shipping. It is a great reproduction that fit beautifully and I have had ZERO issues with it. I put clean gas in..............and clean gas comes out with nothing showing up in the filter. I wish I would have went this route long ago.
My $.02..
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I have used the gravel method on jerry cans before, it pretty much works but heavy rust would be a stretch in my opinion unless you came up with a shaker to do the work for you.
I had my ski doo tank boiled and sealed, but that cost about $200. For $150 you could have a brand new tank.
If you have the guts, you can always fill the tank with water/ inert gas and cut the top off to reach inside the tank. Welding it back up is another story.
-Jesse
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OK, pictures re-sized and rotated.
A bit of advise to all you picture takers, whether with phone or camera.
Turn off Auto Rotate in the camera or phone.
If using a phone, learn which way to turn it so the pics are oriented the right way and always hold the phone that way.
Also, when taking pics you know you'll post, set the resolution in the camera or phone to something like 1024x768 or smaller. If it's set to maximum, you'll get pictures 4 or 5 times larger than you need to post on any forum.
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I just got done cleaning out my tank too! It had a good quarter inch of varnish all over the inside. It was a nitemare. In my research I found you should run hard and fast from using muriatic acid. It doean't actually kill the rust, just dissolves the surface rust you see. It in fact can get into the steel and cause cracking that lets more rust in and in the end accelerates the rusting of the metal. You also have to neutralize it really well afterwards. My tank mainly had the varnish but a little rust. I dumped 3-4 galons of power purple in it for a few days and that loosened a lot of it up, then I put a gallon of acetone in it and sealed every hole. I rotated it around allowing it to soak on all sides for a few days. After that I poured everything out. I ran another gallon of clean acetone through it to make sure I rinsed all the extra crap out. After that I washed it quickly with some soap and my hose then poured in about a gallon of evapo-rust. http://www.evapo-rust.com/ You can pick it up anywhere but I found Harbor Freight sells it by the gallon for a good price. Nice to keep a 5 gallon bucket of it to just toss things in. This stuff works slowly. I sloshed it around and let it sit on different surfaces for another day and it converted and killed most of the rust. I may still have a little more in there but at the cost of more chemicals, I'd be better with a new tank. I saved the left over evapo-rust and washed the tank out with water again. To keep it from flash rusting I think rinsed the water out with about a half gallon of gas. I saved this to run through the cheap lawn mower later this summer. With a dry tank I put a little gas in with some two stroke oil in it and sloshed it around to keep rust out while I worked on painting it. I didn't have any leaks as all my rust was just a little surface rust. For me this worked (I hope.) In your case, I'd be worried about what the muriatic acid did or left behind. A new tank sounds awfully good right about now.
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For a cheap way to "shake" gravel or chain in a fuel tank. Use a small cement mixer. I made a couple L shaped brackets that are attached to the front edge of the drum on my little 3 cu ft mixer I got from one of the Home stores. I then placed a couple pieces of old heavy material like Blue jeans around the opening of the drum. Placed the Tank against this and using heavy bungie cords attached the tank to the drum. I put about a shovel full of crushed 3/8" open rock (no fines all rock is about 3/8") if you can't find this easy to make some from 3/4 minus just screen the rock with a 3/8" mess screen for the first step then do it again with a 1/2" screen you will end up with rock all about 3/8" with sharp edges.
Turn the mixer on and let it run for a hour. (remember to lube the mixer. I then turn the tank 90 degrees and let it run another hour.
Came out looking almost sand blasted but shinier.
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Neat trick Mark, are you going to seal or coat the tank now?
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Neat trick Mark, are you going to seal or coat the tank now?
Nope replacing the tank the process showed where the tank was to damaged to be reused. Once some of the rust was removed it was clear parts of the tank were very very thin.
My younger brother also uses a variation of this method to clean Harley tanks at his bike custom shop. There he is cleaning smaller tanks so he opened up the mouth of the drum and removed the paddles inside. he then uses dense foam blocks to hold the tank in place inside the drum. It is my understanding he does coat the inside of the tank once cleaned.