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Date:         Sun, 11 Feb 2001 14:38:38 -0600
Reply-To:     Max/Joyce Wellhouse <maxjoyce@IPA.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Max/Joyce Wellhouse <maxjoyce@IPA.NET>
Subject:      Gas Tank is In!!(long)
Content-Type: multipart/alternative;

Thanks for the help on getting the gas rank hoses in.

My procedure for doing this job(after losing a lot of time doing head scratching) follows after some commentary. My van is an early 90GL. God help the Synchro owners on this one!!

First, the photos in the Bentley were of marginal help and text even less. Bentley did warn of sanitation needs and Ken should add that to his instructions. There must be differences in the way these crossover pipes are mounted if you take Ken's directions to heart. My tank filler tube had no hose clamp on it, it was a press in/crimp job up by the gas cap. The twin saddle tanks were dificult at best to remove despite only one nut/washer holding them up. My hose arrangement was different than the Bentley also as I had fuel hose crimped on the twin tanks and the plastic T's. The Vanagain kit had adequate fuel hose to fix the old lines, but was short several of the small hose clamps. By my count, I needed 17 hose clampsand not the 10 supplied(one for the return line on driver's side of the tank). I would've liked to have had the o ring for the fuel sender included in this kit, but maybe they never leak. Would've also liked the rubber nipple seal that goes between the overflow tube(tube from side of filler neck that goes into one of the new grommets on pass. side) Silicone will have to do for this trip. Also siliconed the back of the crimp job as part of PM, I guess.

Another hassle I ran into was getting the front of the van high enough to get the tank support bars to work their way out of the hole in the frame. Driving the van up on the ramps was not sufficient, so I had to precariously use the Sears 3 ton floor jack coupled with a cinder block conglomeration to get the nose high enough to clear both of the supports. The tank was wedged in there pretty good so after draining the fuel(as much as I could), I pryed it out and it fell rather abruptly, pulling out the barb/T's from the tank and leaving the old cross pipe hanging from the bracket clamp on the body. Didn't know about that one and no way could I see it. Since I'd already cut all the hoses from the tanks, it was time to grind off the crimp connections with the carbide router tip in my Dremel tool. Plugged up the hole in the tank for sanitation reasons and for fear of a big boom that could've resulted. Cut and fit the new hose(very tight fit despite using MMO to lube the friction points) Somewhere in all that mess, I meticuously cleaned the top and sides of the tank while the holes were still plugged ala Bentley rules. Used simple green and 409. Good news was there wasn't a lick of rust in the bottom of the tank and no sediment coming out of the drain hole.

Now the fun starts. I got the clamps on the copper lines that flank the sides of the tank and inserted the plastic pieces and put the crossover pipe on top of the coolant hoses thinking I could reach them from the front and push the 3 barbs down from there. Bolt the tank in place and go to the front and flail for an hour to try and get the hand/forearm in far enough to get the barbs pushed down. Remembered someone on the list saying it was tight, but my arm wasn't getting within 6" of the grommets. Decided to sleep on it and start over Sunday AM before church.

With the list help, I finally wedged the tank in the front lip and let the back end hang down, supported by an 8" cinderblock and a couple 1" shims. The back needs major support here as you are going to be pushing real hard to get the barbs in. 303 protectant or MMO should make that easier. Ken recommended Vaseline, but didn't have any. Ended up that I had to thread the crossover pipe over everything including a small hydraulic line of some sort and e-brake cable. Still haven't figured out how to get the clamp on. With this angle of atttack and the tank firmly supported I was able to get the driver's side in by laying on my side and reaching way up and pushing as hard as I could. Success! Now to the other side where I have two connectors to pop in. Did the overflow pipe first, but the slack in the crossover pipe now was severely restricted( in the future, I would buy more hose instead of that piece of plastic, whatever diameter it it). a lot of wrestling and fancy language later I got it in and then came the critical step; lifting the rear of the tank with everything in place knowing that if it fell, we got to start all over again. Got lucky and nothing fell and got the tank bolted in. Felt comfortable hooking up the return and supply lines at that point.

Next nightmare was pushing in the filler neck back in to the tank. My filler neck has a plastic ball check valve on it to prevent gas from sloshing up the neck on hard left hand turns I guess, but no photo of that in Bentley. Heck, it took me 30 minutes during disassembly to figure out how the plastic body piece came loose from the body so the filler neck can be freed( rotating it counter clockwise did the trick). I digress. The big o-ring grommet was tighter than Dick's hat band installed on the tank and I was gingerly pushing so I wouldn't damage either the ball valve or the neck(remember 11 yr. old plastic here and Sun. AM) It finally went and then I hooked up the hoses and returned the gas to the tank.

So far, so good. Film at 11!! I'm not dissin' Ken's instructions, but he may have done this fix on a hoist and not known aboutthe clearance problems us back yard mechanics have to deal with. When time permits, I'll maybe get these organized a little better. Maybe a Vanagons for Dummies book is in the offing.

Got to save someone out there from all this hassle. Remember, most of us graduated from the John Muir book mentality of working on the VW.

Dimwitted moose and Flying Squirrel


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