If so, how much does it cost? I went to a machine shop yesterday and told the guy the car had been sitting there since April 2002. He said the gas will gum up after sitting there that long and that I need to have them drop the fuel tank and clean it.

Anyone know how much this costs?

Don't bother telling me otherwise, I talked to 4 other people who all said the same thing, old gasoline will burn you when servicing it if not careful, and it'll also gum up and screw the heads/valvetrain up big time.

 

just siphen it all out and put in some new stuff?

 

1 can of SeaFoam in the gas tank might help

 

Well our family business involves a lot of small engine repair and I'll agree with you that gas can and will go bad if you've had the car stored for that long it can go bad in a matter of months in fact. It becomes almost like a varnish - in small engines it coats all the carb parts and valves and causes real problems (starts and dies.. doesn't start at all etc). Obviously the same or worse would happen with fuel injected setups and would involve some very expensive parts. We don't necessarily clean out the spoiled gas.. we just dump it all out of the tank by removing the line. In your case you have a fuel pump and fuel filter. So, I don't think pumping the gas out of your tank is a good idea as it will probably destroy the pump in which case you'll have to drop the tank to install a new pump (or "butcher" your car by cutting "the hole" - I'm not even going to go there ). Somehow I don't think siphoning the gas out is a good idea either.. BUT if your desperate to not pay big $$$ or spend the time to drop the tank it seems to me that's your only option. The gas will not however be more harmful or dangerous simply because it has spoiled... er rather.. if MAY be but that doesn't matter.. just don't do anything stupid (sparks, electricity, fire, etc) and you'll be fine. Just treat it the same as anything extremely flammable - keep it the f*ck away from sources of ignition

I will say that you certainly should not start the car under any circumstances nor should you turn on the key (fuel pump will engage). If you're feeling lucky go ahead and try and siphon out as much as you can and then put in fresh gas and a fuel system cleaner and give it a go. I personally would not try this but hey.. it's your car. I would just drop the tank and install a nice walbro intank pump while I was at it. A new high volume walbro intank pump is a worthwhile mod anyways if you ever plan on doing any mods past boltons and minor valvetrain work - esp necessary if a poweradder is in the future.

Anyways, I've never dealt with this problem on a CAR specifically so take my advice for what it's worth. Maybe someone who has had this same situation can chime in and let us know how he solved it.

Good luck,

 

You clearly know what you're talking about. THe guy at the machine shop said it begins to smell like paint varnish and gum up as well. I've come too far to do a half *** job of fixing the car.

I will take your advice and drop the tank and have it steam cleaned. Do you have the part # for that walbro fuel pump and/or where I can get it.

 

It has been sitting less than a year and the gas has gone bad? Are you sure it is actually bad? I have had cars sit for a very long time and not have varnish in the fuel tank. The gas will go "stale" but it won't be varnish. It takes the volume of gas in the fuel tank about 2 years to really go south around here. Does it smell like varnished fuel or does it smell like gasoline if you take the cap off? Varnish has an odor that cannot be mistaken, it smells nothing like gasoline. I.E. if it smells strongly of anything other than gas, you will have to get it out of there.

The best way to handle it is to siphon out the fuel with a proper siphoning hose. If you can't get that to work you can pump it out with the fuel pump. If the gas is not really bad (It does go bad in hot climates faster and in Michigan it isn't hot all year round) just drive the vehicle until you get some space in the tank and then top it off with Premium and drive it until it gets down to less than 1/4. Then fill it back up again and change the fuel filter.

 

Well, a borad member thats working on it is an employee at a dealership here. He said, he can remove the cap and smell it, that as you said, the odor is THAT distinct. He also said that he'd test the fuel system using a sump pmp or something like that. Either way, I'm too paranoid to risk messing the vehucle up this severely, infact I'm so paranoid , I won't even believe the results of the test, The car has been sitting there for so long I'm scared to cheap out or do anything wrong.

 

umm since April 02 is not a very long time..i wouldnt really worry about it that much....just get the old gas out...put 2 cans of sea foam in there and top it off with some good fuel (maybe some race gas ) and u should be good to go.

 

I agree completely with you saying that you should be absolutely sure the gas has spoiled. It does spoil faster here in fl because of the warm temps.. the gas will spoil over 1 winter of sitting - basically 5 or 6 months.. sometimes less You will absolutely be able to tell if it's spoiled by the smell and also the color - assuming you can get some outta the tank. It will be very yellow instead of the usual clear. Be absolutely sure it is spoiled before you take the time to do all this work because I hear dropping the tank is a bit of a PITA. I would also search around the board and wait for some more second opinions esp. from someone who has had this particular problem before. Maybe siphoning is all you need to do.. I dunno. A small amount of bad gas may not be too bad if you can siphon most of it out. I know we would dispose of the bad gas by putting a little of it into our beater work truck every so often - less than a coffecan full though and that car was carb'ed not fuel injected. Didn't seem to have any problems but then again it wasn't one of our "babies" like the camaros are. Anyways, I would hate to cause you to do to way more work then you need to so please examine the situation closely before you act. There are several different models of the walbro intank units - they flow at different rates and the higher volume ones of course cost more. I don't think most sane people would ever need more than a 255liter per hour pump. I think IRS or some advertiser on the board here sells a kit to install a walbro pump in a camaro tank using the stock bucket etc. I think the kit is pretty pricey and some say it is unecessary.. but I dunno since I've never had a peek inside my tank and dunno how things look or work exactly. Do a search on "walbro intank" and you should find more than what you need to know.

Hope this helps you out,

 

I have actually dealt with this problem about a week or so ago. My car had been sitting a LONG time. It would not start and the fuel had gone "stale".... If I'm not mistaken... I don't think you can siphon fuel out of these tanks, through the neck of them. I dropped mine out... took the pump out,,, and turned the tank upside down and fought with it for 1/2 an hour or so, shaking it back and forth,,, til' I got all the fuel out of it. Not exactly what I call fun!


I went ahead and put a 255lph in mine and cycled the key twice.... and it started right up. I would've liked to cleaned the inside of the tank a little better than what I had. You can look at this from all aspects but I thought.... If it's going to go out on me... big deal... I'll just know next time to clean the tank. But I find it hard to believe that the stale/varnish particles will work themselves loose when you basically have to scrub the p*ss out of them to clean it. These pumps are $125 out of Summit. I just hope the rest of my fuel system is alright.

 

Its not the fuel I'm so concerned about, its what the EFFECTS of the fuel can cause. If I crank that motor over, and that gas is jelly-like, my valves and heads are gone and I'm back in the same boat.

I'd rather be safe than sorry, even if dropping the pan is a PITA. I'm not a big believe in this test because I've never heard of it. If it was up to me, I'd just as soon drive it like I stole it, but I'm over cautious/sensitive to this car letting me down again. I don't have the kind of money it'll take to fix it again.

The guy at the machine shop told me to bring him a sample of the gas and he'll tell me if its bad.

Nohrspwr: How long was LONG for you?

 

It's tricky, but you CAN siphon the gas. I used 3/4" neoprene tubing. You gotta maneuver it to get it to go down into the bottom of the tank.

 

It also helps a load if you lubricate the outside of the siphon tube with motor oil. It usually gets caught on the high friction bends in the fill pipe.

 

well... It was longer than a year... Myself... I really don't know... but I think somewhere around four years. I think you are over-reacting. I'd just do like one of the other guys mentioned... siphon it out... and be done with it. You are just being too over-cautious.... (which is a good thing).... later,

 

Pull the fuel line at the intake, run a hose to a can, then jumper the FP, the wire is next to the pcm. Run all the fuel out, add a gallon or two of new and flush that out, then top it off with a fillup and a can of seafoam, your done. Fuel starts smelling bad way before it "gums" up.