Jump to content
SAU Community

Recommended Posts

Hi All,

My car have been sitting for years with fuel in the tank and the fuel actually smells pretty bad..

Has anyone cleaned out their fuel tank before? or know of any places that can clean it? I got a quote from a place and they said $399 to get the tank cleaned lol

Any help/recommendation would be highly appreciated.

Thanks

Link to comment
https://www.sau.com.au/forums/topic/481287-gtr-r32-fuel-tank-cleaning/
Share on other sites

Yep I have cleaned multiple fuel tanks as I have cracked a 32 GTR fuel tank more than once. You're talking about the molasses like shit left from unleaded fuel right ? No, unleaded will not move it like you would think. After much trial and error -

Bleach. Doesn't react with the HDPE the plastic tank is made out of. The bleach bottles are made out of the same material. Get about 8 - 10 litres, leave overnight. Swirl and agitate next day as required. It will bring it back to new.

  • Like 1
39 minutes ago, BK said:

Yep I have cleaned multiple fuel tanks as I have cracked a 32 GTR fuel tank more than once. You're talking about the molasses like shit left from unleaded fuel right ? No unleaded will not move it like you would think. After much trial and error -

Bleach. Doesn't react with the HDPE the plastic tank is made out of. The bleach bottles are made out of the same material. Get about 8 - 10 litres, leave overnight. Swirl and agitate next day as required. It will bring it back to new.

Set for it, thanks mate ??

16024003665641214337333073242163.jpg

  • Like 1

Fully serious. Test it on a gummy hose clamp or something else from your tank. It will strip the crap off everything. Obviously make sure your tank is pressure washed afterwards and left to dry, as the last thing you want in your fuel system is bleach. Results may vary depending on the crud in your tank, might need more but it's a good start with 8lt and will 100% work. Please post results for confirmation as I've seen no one recommend it before and has proven for me to be the only sure way that works. If you can seal the tank and invert it even better, as getting it off of the bulkhead area is the hardest part. Good round up weed killer substitute afterwards.

  • 4 weeks later...
On 11/10/2020 at 7:19 PM, BK said:

Fully serious. Test it on a gummy hose clamp or something else from your tank. It will strip the crap off everything. Obviously make sure your tank is pressure washed afterwards and left to dry, as the last thing you want in your fuel system is bleach. Results may vary depending on the crud in your tank, might need more but it's a good start with 8lt and will 100% work. Please post results for confirmation as I've seen no one recommend it before and has proven for me to be the only sure way that works. If you can seal the tank and invert it even better, as getting it off of the bulkhead area is the hardest part. Good round up weed killer substitute afterwards.

Hi mate,

Here's the results and the process;

1) Empty the old fuel and dispose

2) Degrease the fuel tank inside out

3) Pressure wash is multiple times

4) I put in 12l of bleach and shake the fuel tank to make sure it reaches everywhere

5) Left it overnight and came back the next day and pressure washed it again, and again and again lol 

6) Air dryed

7) Cleaned the outside of the tank and give it a fresh coat of satin black paint

 

20201101_132340.jpg

20201101_132352.jpg

20201103_070120.jpg

20201103_070134.jpg

20201103_070138.jpg

  • Like 1
  • 2 years later...
On 10/11/2020 at 5:33 PM, BK said:

Yep I have cleaned multiple fuel tanks as I have cracked a 32 GTR fuel tank more than once. You're talking about the molasses like shit left from unleaded fuel right ? No, unleaded will not move it like you would think. After much trial and error -

Bleach. Doesn't react with the HDPE the plastic tank is made out of. The bleach bottles are made out of the same material. Get about 8 - 10 litres, leave overnight. Swirl and agitate next day as required. It will bring it back to new.

Many thanks @BK!

Put in 10L of bleach, sloshed it around every now and again over 24 hours. Pressure washed it after draining the bleach out. Not perfect, but massive improvement and happy with the results. Pics below, the tank was still wet when I took the before and after shots.

 

Before:

Before162518.thumb.jpg.c011184c809f668f972d695089eb6557.jpg

Before162527.thumb.jpg.8ed645bdbd216cb68d284da15a4764e4.jpg

Before162538.thumb.jpg.e4bd3ffb7ff882cf56bf6cd31bb6dc2e.jpg

 

After:

After173741.thumb.jpg.f64cd3c53e567aa49fecaeefe7998d44.jpg

After173841.thumb.jpg.18169a61f0dab6dd43e0bf3da127ea33.jpg

After173752.thumb.jpg.e057aa414dd50aa9f8af7c14ecc8afa7.jpg

After173802.thumb.jpg.b1bff18790c19847f5920371a92e0826.jpg

  • Like 1
On 13/01/2023 at 1:19 PM, Zurlox said:

Many thanks @BK!

Put in 10L of bleach, sloshed it around every now and again over 24 hours. Pressure washed it after draining the bleach out. Not perfect, but massive improvement and happy with the results. Pics below, the tank was still wet when I took the before and after shots.

 

Before:

Before162518.thumb.jpg.c011184c809f668f972d695089eb6557.jpg

Before162527.thumb.jpg.8ed645bdbd216cb68d284da15a4764e4.jpg

Before162538.thumb.jpg.e4bd3ffb7ff882cf56bf6cd31bb6dc2e.jpg

 

After:

After173741.thumb.jpg.f64cd3c53e567aa49fecaeefe7998d44.jpg

After173841.thumb.jpg.18169a61f0dab6dd43e0bf3da127ea33.jpg

After173752.thumb.jpg.e057aa414dd50aa9f8af7c14ecc8afa7.jpg

After173802.thumb.jpg.b1bff18790c19847f5920371a92e0826.jpg

No worries, good job. If you persisted for days you would've got that solid stuff off but it does look pretty caked on. Might have needed to use a solvent for that last bit then rebleach to get it 100%

Looks good anyway 👍

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Similar Content

  • Latest Posts

    • The time is always correct. Only the date is wrong. It currently thinks it is January 19. Tomorrow it will say it is January 20. The date and time are ( should be ! ) retrieved from the GPS navigation system.
    • Buy yourself a set of easy outs. See if they will get a good bite in and unthread it.   Very very lucky the whole sender didn't let go while on the track and cost you a motor!
    • Well GTSBoy, prepare yourself further. I did a track day with 1/2 a day prep on Friday, inpromptu. The good news is that I got home, and didn't drive the car into a wall. Everything seemed mostly okay. The car was even a little faster than it was last time. I also got to get some good datalog data too. I also noticed a tiny bit of knock which was (luckily?) recorded. All I know is the knock sensors got recalibrated.... and are notorious for false knock. So I don't know if they are too sensitive, not sensitive enough... or some other third option. But I reduced timing anyway. It wasn't every pull through the session either. Think along the lines of -1 degree of timing for say, three instances while at the top of 4th in a 20 minute all-hot-lap session. Unfortunately at the end of session 2... I noticed a little oil. I borrowed some jack stands and a jack and took a look under there, but as is often the case, messing around with it kinda half cleaned it up, it was not conclusive where it was coming from. I decided to give it another go and see how it was. The amount of oil was maybe one/two small drops. I did another 20 minute session and car went well, and I was just starting to get into it and not be terrified of driving on track. I pulled over and checked in the pits and saw this: This is where I called it, packed up and went home as I live ~20 min from the track with a VERY VERY CLOSE EYE on Oil Pressure on the way home. The volume wasn't much but you never know. I checked it today when I had my own space/tools/time to find out what was going on, wanted to clean it up, run the car and see if any of the fittings from around the oil filter were causing it. I have like.. 5 fittings there, so I suspected one was (hopefully?) the culprit. It became immediately apparent as soon as I looked around more closely. 795d266d-a034-4b8c-89c9-d83860f5d00a.mp4       This is the R34 GTT oil sender connected via an adapter to an oil cooler block I have installed which runs AN lines to my cooler (and back). There's also an oil temp sensor on top.  Just after that video, I attempted to unthread the sensor to see if it's loose/worn and it disintegrated in my hand. So yes. I am glad I noticed that oil because it would appear that complete and utter catastrophic engine failure was about 1 second of engine runtime away. I did try to drill the fitting out, and only succeeded in drilling the middle hole much larger and now there's a... smooth hole in there with what looks like a damn sleeve still incredibly tight in there. Not really sure how to proceed from here. My options: 1) Find someone who can remove the stuck fitting, and use a steel adapter so it won't fatigue? (Female BSPT for the R34 sender to 1/8NPT male - HARD to find). IF it isn't possible to remove - Buy a new block ($320) and have someone tap a new 1/8NPT in the top of it ($????) and hope the steel adapter works better. 2) Buy a new block and give up on the OEM pressure sender for the dash entirely, and use the supplied 1/8 NPT for the oil temp sender. Having the oil pressure read 0 in the dash with the warning lamp will give me a lot of anxiety driving around. I do have the actual GM sensor/sender working, but it needs OBD2 as a gauge. If I'm datalogging I don't actually have a readout of what the gauge is currently displaying. 3) Other? Find a new location for the OEM sender? Though I don't know of anywhere that will work. I also don't know if a steel adapter is actually functionally smart here. It's clearly leveraged itself through vibration of the motor and snapped in half. This doesn't seem like a setup a smart person would replicate given the weight of the OEM sender. Still pretty happy being lucky for once and seeing this at the absolute last moment before bye bye motor in a big way, even if an adapter is apparently 6 weeks+ delivery and I have no way to free the current stuck/potentially destroyed threads in the current oil block.
    • Literally looks like direct port nitrous haha
×
×
  • Create New...