I decided to run my car a about 1/8 tank and drain it. The car had been sitting a lot before i bought it, and i wanted to make sure there wasnt any really old gas left in it. all i can say is thank God for the fuel filter cause this was pretty ugly.

i wiped my finger through some of the debris at the bottome of the container i drained into.



this ones kinda hard to see. this is the second full pan i had. It looks like ive been looking for gold!!




I mightve wasted about $5 in gas, so i didnt loose much. and now i know its clean. I will also never run the car almost empty, theres just too much crap in the bottom.

 

Wow, good thing you decided to drain it. My car has been sitting with about a half tank and premix, so I should do the same when I drive it again. How did you drain it, just siphon? Where do you think that crud came from?

 

Theres a plug just for draining. and i have no idea where it came from it appears to be solid pieces of metal, some of which are reasonably large. I didnt find any signs of the gas being gelled....well, in all reality the gas i drained was probably new, as i bought the car in St louis, and drove it to St augustine FL. so ive filled up at least 7-8 times in the month ive had it.

 

could that possibly be part of the fuel pump????

 

^ I guess? i really dont know....it seems like it would have to be that, or the tank itself.

 

Running the car empty doesn't really help avoid sucking in the dirt. The fuel pickup is always at the bottom of the tank.

Good idea though to clean things out. If you wanted to be really thorough you could dismount the tank and wash it.

Dave

 

True, but running completly low would probably make a higher concentration of whatever crap happened to be in the tank...... i think...well, maybe.

 

i was just about to drain my tank today.. i tried for 15 min to get a siphon going then found out theres a drain plug.. lol. is it the one right in the middle front of the tank.. looks like a ~14mm?

 

yes. and just so you know, it takes quite a while to drain it all.

 

Why does it seem like so few people know about that drain plug?

 

Disconnect the fuel return hose or remove the gas cap and prop the flapper open. It will drain MUCH faster that way

Dave

 

Dam I might do that next time I'm under the car. I gotta admit I'm usually running my car close to empty constantly which can't be good at all.

Does anyone have a photo of this drain plug? When it comes to fuel I just don't want to be opening up the wrong bolt.

 

You can't miss it. It's the only one on the bottom of the tank.

 

Be careful working around highly flammable gasoline. Most cameras are not intrinsically safe and could present an ignition source. The flash could be the last thing you see before waking up in the burn unit ....

later

 

Good thing I read this thread. I'm in interest on hyperion's surge cover and It makes a bit more sense to drain the entire gas tank to install hyperion's surge cover. Opposed to what folks in the last group buy are doing. This makes much more sense. I feel everyone should do maintenance on their fuel tanks after reading this.

 

woe! i never even thought about it! i was directly above the pan of gas, snapping pictures! lol. I would do this in an extremely ventilated area. Minimize the chance of igniting, and save some of your brain cells

 

I just drained and cleaned a gas tank.

My suggestion is to take it out of the car (not bad once it's empty). First tape off the openings with duct tape and wash/scrub the outside thoroughly. You'll need a good brush and you'll get totally filthy. Take off the tape and splash some simple green in there and use a hose to wash it out. Shake the whole tank good and dump it out. Now hose with water and repeat until all the simple green is gone. Drain all the water out that you can, and now take a hot air gun on low heat and point it into the tank. It took just a couple hours with the hot air gun to clean the tank to bone dry.

Dave

 

couple of hours sound so long... HAHA!

 

How did you dispose of the old gas? Just throw it in the daily driver? haha

 

+1. My autozone doesnt take them. I don't think blowing up 2-3 gallons worth of fuel in a field is a good idea .

 

nice camera..haa.

 

thats what im doing, 15 gallons of premium is no joke

 

The same place all your garbage should go.....over the fence and into the neighbors yard.

 

You can use a really long skinny funnel to pour it into another vehicle. If you're worried about it being dirty, just filter it with coffee filters. (But that is a slow process)

 

When i drained my tank, i just removed the fuel feed line from the fuel pump (on the tank) and pushed another piece of fuel hose over it. I ran this into the filler neck of my other rX7, handily parked alongside - and then just bridged the F/P and GND terminals on the diagnosis connector.

This makes the fuel pump run and just pumps all the fuel out of the tank. Doesnt get it all, but gets enough to install the surge cover.

After that, i just reversed the procedure and pumped all the gas back into the other RX7