I managed to get a few hours of work in on the snake over the weekend.
Last weekend I removed the gas tank and this weekend I started out by
cleaning the inside as much as possible so that I could do some work on
it without blowing myself to Kingdom Come. My main tank effort
consisted of removing one of the 10-32 screws for the fuel gauge sender
which had broken off. Actually it had broken off last time I worked on
the tank but I had let it go then. First I tried grabbing what was left
of the top of the screw with vice grips but that didn't work. I'd been
soaking it with Liquid Wrench all week but it was still frozen. Next I
tried cutting a slot in it with a hacksaw and unscrewing it. That
didn't work either. Next I drilled a hole through it and tried using an
easy-out. When the easy-out flexed to the point where I thought it
would break if I applied any more torque, I gave up on that too.
Finally I used a screwdriver and a hammer to collapse the outside of the
hollow screw inwards and was able to work it loose and push it through
the hole. This did some damage to the brass threads in the plate the
screw was in but I was able to clear the threads with a tap and I think
they'll be okay.
The bigger problem was getting the filler cap/neck assembly off of the
car since there's no way I would be able to fit the short piece of
rubber hose that goes between it and the tank with it in place. The
filler neck goes through a hole in the body just large enough for it to
fit through. Another piece somewhat like a very short pipe nipple
screws on to the neck to hold it to the body. This pieces is 1/8 to
3/16" larger than the neck and is too big to clear the hole. This piece
was frozen to the neck. I tried everything I could think of to get them
apart but nothing worked. Finally I just gave up and pulled it through
the hole. This bent some body sheet metal a bit so now I'm in the
process of doing/leaning aluminum body work. I'd have preferred to
postpone this lesson for awhile. Aluminum sheet metal working tips
welcome.
Even with the filler assembly out of the car, it was still difficult to
separate the pieces. I heated the neck/nipple pieces repeatedly and
applied lots of Liquid Wrench in between. Eventually I did get them
apart but even after wire brushing the threads, the pieces were still
hard to screw by hand.
Well, the fitting size at the tank outlet is still a mystery. After
carefully measuring the distance between threads, I concluded that the
pitch was 14 per inch. In spite of not being able to screw a 1-14 nut
onto the male fitting I'd removed from the tank, I decided to try 1-14
bolt in the female half. It screwed in easily but was too loose to be
the correct diameter. Well, at least I know the thread pitch. Was
there a Whitworth size just slightly over 1"? Maybe 33/32 or
thereabouts? One of my Whitworth wrenches was the only one that would
work on the fitting.
About all that's left now is to decide where to send the tank for
boiling out and coating. I've gotten several suggestions and I've
called some places. Turns out not every shop does the same thing. One
place I called merely boils out the tank to remove scale and crud but
doesn't do any de-rusting. They just "seal" the remaining rust. I'm
very wary of this approach but on the other hand, I'm concerned about
de-rusting acids stripping off the zinc(?) plating on the tank. I
suppose I'll just pick a place and take my chances.
Roland
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