Date:         Thu, 13 Apr 95 17:36:37 EDT
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Richard <rapalmer@unity.ncsu.edu>
Subject:      CHECK FUEL LINES NOW!!!!!!!!!!

 Wow, I just had a crazy experience. Luckily, it ended up rather
humorously, but it could have been tragic. 
     My girlfriend recently purchased a '69 Bug, and I thought we had
gone through it pretty well. However, as we were filling up with gas
today, and after about 3 or so gallons, I noticed gas was streaming out all
over the ground. I looked up under there, and saw a ruptured piece of
fuel line, about 8", going from the tank to the rear. I had no idea it
was there, and apparently no one else had either. While all the other
fuel line had been replaced, this crusty old piece looked original. 
  Well, the station manager came out and began to freak, so we pushed
the bug over to a corner. Since the gas kept pouring out, (3 gallons is
a lot, when it's spewing on the ground), he called the fire dept. 
Meanwhile, I walked up the street to a garage, and paid $1.33 for some
new line. Since the line had to be completely replaced, I waited for all
the gas to drain. So, the fire Dept. arrived after everything was pretty
much dry, and basically laughed, bacause some of my friends had stopped
by, and here were these hippies, watching gas spill everywhere as the
manager was totally upset. 
     Eventually, the tank was empty, and I quickly replaced the damaged
line. We then still had to wait for them to clean up everything, and of
course all this was on my lucnh hour (now 2.5 hrs...)

    SOOOOOOO... the moral of this story, is check those fuel lines now!
IF this had been an engine line, then
POOF! it only takes 5 minutes to DESTROY a vehicle by gas fire.
Unfortunately, I've seen it happen. We got lucky this time, but you
never know...
Oh, the funny thing was, we were on the way to get the car inspected!!!
:)
anyway
Happy Easter
Richard