cleaning portable metal gas tanks

[old boat 54]

Uncle cleaned out his garage and gave me a Omc 6 gallon metal tank. Not in bad shape, but the typical ... still had some old gas/oil mixture in it. Going to dump it and pull float to see what inside looks like. On the current one I own that came with a boat purchase, I remove float, and dropped in a small chain and rotated it to remove rust and junk from the bottom. Not to much in there as this tanks was in good shape.
Anyone else use this or other methods ? Anyone use any "coating" material to seal inside of tank?
I know the plastic tanks dont have this problem, but I perfer the metal.

 

[crxess]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

Liquid bladder for motorcycle tanks works very well.

 

[old boat 54]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

thanks for info .... Does this harden up pretty good ? My brother and I did a couple of motorcycle tanks years ago .... probably 30 yrs ago. Dont remember what we used but it really never hardened up, and seemed a little gooey. It never worked its way into carbs, but we did not use it again.
How did you clean / prepare tank ?

 

[ondarvr]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

Is this an old double hose model or a newer one? If its an old one, then it may pay to work on it a little. If its the new style, throw it away and spend the $20.00 for a new plastic one.

 

[Home Cookin']

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

use a can of spray carb cleaner and squab out with a rag on a stick. But if it's rusty you will have rust flake problems forever. If it leaks around the bottom seam, too, toss it.
get new hoses.

 

[modzr]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

If you need to repair - Google "POR-15 fuel tank repair". I have used it on a couple older restorations. It will even seal small pinholes, and is an amaxing repair. Reasonable cost too.

 

[sbump52]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

When I cleaned my old double line tank, I put small aquarium gravel and poured some Pasagel stuff in with it and shook it around like you did with the chain. Took the rust out, then I rinsed it with clean water to remove the small gravel and Pasagel. Poured some alcohol in then to dry it out and let it sit out in sun. Put a filter on it and filled it up to the top with gas and oil. No problems for three years now. Good luck.

 

[old boat 54]

Re: cleaning portable metal gas tanks

Thanks for the replies guys.