petseal ethanol etc ......

[richard]

hi . a rather old school Bond owner has contacted me today with his problem . The petseal in his tank , used to seal rust flakes in the fuel , seems to be itself flaking off the tank and blocking his fuel line - not yet his carb . i told him all i knew on the subject , after all its been much discussed here and in the press . 5% increase , from 5- 10 % , in the amount of ethanol used in petrol causing disintegration of both fibreglass fuel tanks and petseal .
okay so the new fuel tank sealants are ethanol resistant BUT how does he clear out the remaining petseal from his tank ? what "solution" should he use ?
something fairly simple preferably - thanks

[Bob Purton]

I have completed this process twice so far in two different tanks. I used a water based paint stripper. After removing the tap I plugged the hole with pine dowel and then pored in some of the paint stripper. You don't need to fill up the whole tank, just a pint or two will suffice, once you have some in there and put the cap back on the fumes from the stripper did the rest. I also rotated my tank periodically to ensure the stripper was coating all areas of the tank. Leave it for a few hours and once you are sure all the sealant is off you can carefully pour out the stripper. Then starts the time consuming job of flushing all the residue out with clean water, this is why I used a water based stripper, you need to flush it out many times and water is cheap, use a solvent based stripper and the flushing process becomes expensive and messy. 
There will be other ways but this is how I did it.
Once clean and dry you need to select an ethanol resistant seal, I have had good results with flowliner from Wildes motorcycles.  Por15 is also supposed to be a good product.  I have heard Petseal is just about the worst one to use although I have never tried it. You pays ya money and takes ya choice!.

[AndrewG]

Not strictly relevant but Bob's description seems a detailed account of how a neighbour did his tank - except I was called in to do the sloshing-about bit as he had hurt his back and I can testify that sloshing a decent-sized tank is more vigorous than the dance moves of any generation. Damn nearly put my back out too....

[richard]

thanks very much , you wouldn't have a brand of the water based stripper would you ? cheers

[Barry]

Update Bob.

If you are referring to the Messerschmitt tank, the white coating inside has now generally fallen off and I am looking at resealing it like Richard - so, very interested in the best Ethanol resistant sealer.

[Jim Janecek]

I have never known any POR15 sealer to fail when properly applied:

http://www.por15.com/POR-15-Motorcycle-Fuel-Tank-Repair-Kit-_p_106.html

We've had ethanol in gasoline now for many years in the USA.

If you do apply ANY sealer, the tank MUST be properly prepped in advance. If you just slosh some fuel around and then apply the sealer, any sealer will fall off in a few years.
Tank needs to be cleaned, then use a Phosphoric Acid solution and mechanical abrasion (handful of nuts, or a small length of steel chain) while soaking/sloshing the Acid prep around.  The tank must be clean and rust-free before putting any sealant in.

the sealants I HAVE seen fail were not prepped properly or the owner was cheap and used something like glassfibre resin to coat the tank.  Works for a short period of time, then the gasoline dissolves it all and you get lumps of gooey resin, what a nightmare to clean up.

[Bob Purton]

Update Bob.

If you are referring to the Messerschmitt tank, the white coating inside has now generally fallen off and I am looking at decorating it like Richard - so, very interested in the best Ethanol resistant sealer.

Barry, The liner in your Schmitt tank was Flowliner and was put in about 14 years ago. It was the old pre-ethanol type so if its only recently broken down it must be as a result of the ethanol added to the petrol recently. The new version of Flowliner is advertised as ethanol proof. My chum Nigel used Por15 in his Chinese monkey bike tank recently and was happy with the process, too early of course to tell if its good but its been around for years and Jim seems confident of it. I should give it a try.

[Bob Purton]

thanks very much , you wouldn't have a brand of the water based stripper would you ? cheers

As I recall, Nitromores do a waterbased stripper. Also, in agreement with Jim, you do need to treat the metal with a suitable chemical cleaner/etcher before using the sealer. POR15 do there own cleaner you can buy with the sealer.   http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/like/231179267678?limghlpsr=true&hlpv=2&ops=true&viphx=1&hlpht=true&lpid=108&device=c&adtype=pla&crdt=0&ff3=1&ff11=ICEP3.0.0&ff12=67&ff13=80&ff14=108

[Barry]

Update Bob.

If you are referring to the Messerschmitt tank, the white coating inside has now generally fallen off and I am looking at decorating it like Richard - so, very interested in the best Ethanol resistant sealer.

Barry, The liner in your Schmitt tank was Flowliner and was put in about 14 years ago. It was the old pre-ethanol type so if its only recently broken down it must be as a result of the ethanol added to the petrol recently. The new version of Flowliner is advertised as ethanol proof. My chum Nigel used Por15 in his Chinese monkey bike tank recently and was happy with the process, too early of course to tell if its good but its been around for years and Jim seems confident of it. I should give it a try.

I gathered that was the case Bob.  I'm not complaining. Did the tank leak before or was it just a precaution?  I will try one of the suggested sealers and follow the instructions carefully.

[Bob Purton]

It didn't leak so you could just remove the flaky liner and use the tank as it is.

[or accept a full refund for the car!] 

[steven mandell]

My research revealed Red  Coat liner to be a product with an almost 100% success rate when applied properly.
I am also a long time user of POR 15 for other purposes, but found that after about 15 years of  painting it on to the inside of a very infrequently used brass tank filler tube, that it separated out as a flimsy but still intact shell.
Adhesion to the brass may have been the culprit here.  But still heard of higher number of complications than with Red Coat when I researched it. Possibly Red Coat is less finicky as you end up with a more flexibly compliant and almost self annealing surface.
It is also quite economical.  I believe that I found it on Amazon at about $35 for a quart, which definitely left enough to do at least one more tank after coating the admittingly small tank in my Snuggy.  Seals up stubborn leaks also.
Was the cure all for my Snuggy tank leak that I first welded, then brazed then soldered but still wouldn't seal tight even after I had patched in a whole new section. 

I could have saved myself from a couple of days of disasters if I just used the Red Coat first, as my oxyacetylene torch caused major warping of the tank side, and I ended up doing extensive body work to restore the appearance of the tank!

[Bob Purton]

I don't think Red-kote is available in the uk but it does always seem to get favourable reports on the web. Did I read somewhere that higher proportions of ethanol have been used in the USA for some time? Longer than in the UK?  If that's the case using an American made product would surely be a good idea for us in Blighty. I love how you are still using medieval weights and measures Steven! In a way its sad we have lost them although the metric system is much much easier to use. What did you pay, 3 groats?

[steven mandell]

Alcohol has been around to varying proportions in various areas here in the states since about 1990.
The percentage of alcohol used has been subject to both political and economic forces, so has varied widely due to many influences.  Suffice it to say that pre 1998 manufactured vehicles will have problems, and those problems have been getting significantly worse for the past 10 years, and worse still in the last 5 years with the almost universal mandate of 10% ethanol in gas here.  Since it is added by the distributor, and the shelf life is ONLY THREE MONTHS, it can often exceed this mix ratio/ be contaminated by water contamination and consequent unrestorable phase separation, as the alcohol is so anhydrous that it will attract water far beyond its ability to absorb it.

The tiny idle jets on the Badsey Bullet prototype will clog if I forget to start it in just one month's time!  Consequently, this last  (4th) time I rebuilt the quadruple set up, I added a small dash panel and switch to turn off the electric fuel pump, so that I can run it out of gas prior to shutting off if I am not sure that I will be driving it again soon.
I drained one of the carbs after "running it out of gas", and then poured it back into the decarbureted float bowl whilst it was sitting on mu work bench to verify that the idle/ primary jets would be above the residual gas level.  The mains will still be in the wet, but are much larger- so I should be OK with this mod.

Red Coat has had plenty of time to evolve their formulation to deal with this chicanery- hence the great revues. relative ease of use, and economy.   I can get many quarts for the single goat that I trade.

[Bob Purton]

That all makes sense Steven except for the goats thing! How many groats for a goat?

[Rob Dobie]

Just found nearly a gallon of POR 15 Metal Ready, 4 years old (now called Metal Prep) http://www.frost.co.uk/por15-prep-metal-ready.html  in my shed. I fell over it when looking for a sledge hammer to break up my pond. It has to go, just like the pond.
Anyone want it? Take a trip to sunny Eastbourne via Polegate and pick it up on the way. Rob.  Too wet to post.