Back to Idaho and the 1200's fueling issues, aha!

78jotadave

78jotadave

Hero member
Location
Palm Desert, California. (near Palm Springs)
I'm back up in Idaho from Southern California after a 2800-mile van road trip with the wife and three dogs taking in Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Montana, and then up to Northern Idaho. I have to say the USA is a great country to travel through, with stunning scenery and great people, 21 days camped every night(y)(y).
Tackled the 1200, discovered fuel lines full of pink flakes, drained the fuel tank, and removed the fuel taps to find the filters clogged with pink flakes and crud. I discovered the tank liner (why do people use this crap) was, is separating from the metal I was able to pull pieces of the liner out of the filler cap in long strips along with crud that dries to a powder, see photo.

My plan now is to remove the liner utilizing Acetone, clean the carbs, ultrasonic cleaner if necessary, and hopefully get the 1200 good to go again. Any tips or recommendations on the successful removal of a tank liner are welcome.
Cheers Dave
 

Attachments

  • IMG_3669.JPG
    IMG_3669.JPG
    140.7 KB · Views: 18
People usually have a reason why they line tanks, either rust or pinholes, the latter usually applies to fibreglass. So maybe you will need to do the acetone and then Citric acid for rust. I think there was a recent post on How To with Citric acid. I found the long thin plastic niples used on Sicaflex tubes work well to plug the fuel tap holes. Not sure if Acetone eats that or not. You could wittle some plugs out of Cedar. Bang them in enough to hold but don't go nuts and bust the tank
 
Odd that the liner has disintegrated but there is no leaking. Like Vince says, why was it done in the first place? The cement mixer, the tank with loose screws in it and in a sleeping bag for protection might do it as it is already breaking down, other than chemical removal.
 
I use Methylene Chloride to remove tank liners
Works well on most tank liners, not so well on Epoxy liners like Caswell
 
Yes, methylene chloride is a good choice as it dissolves most everything. If you accidentally get any on the paint, you are gonna have to repaint the tank!

I usually mix it with paint remover.
 
Vince said:
People usually have a reason why they line tanks, either rust or pinholes, the latter usually applies to fibreglass. So maybe you will need to do the acetone and then Citric acid for rust. I think there was a recent post on How To with Citric acid. I found the long thin plastic niples used on Sicaflex tubes work well to plug the fuel tap holes. Not sure if Acetone eats that or not. You could wittle some plugs out of Cedar. Bang them in enough to hold but don't go nuts and bust the tank
Click to expand...
No, people line tanks because folklore has it that it's a protection against rust/alcohol/beer/loose women. Just like we used to use lead substitute and others no doubt use miracle products for alcohol in fuel.
The only indication for liners are pinholes but that's a bad indication, you need to cut out the section with pinholes and weld a new section in.
You do need a liner in a new fibreglass tank however.
Putting a liner in a rusty tank is making the knot to hang yourself with.
Acetone may dilute liners but it's above all an excellent paint stripper.
When you've got rid of the liner, repaint the tank.
Paul
 
Alzero said:
I thought methylene chloride WAS paint remover?
Click to expand...
As of a couple of years ago here in the USA, methylene chloride was banned from use in paint removers. It also used to be in carburetor cleaner.

So is you buy some paint remover today, you need to add it back in to have a paint remover that actually works.
 
If nothing truly clears ALL the liner crap out I reckon I'd be cutting the bottom out of the tank and doing the job thoroughly. It's no bighie to reweld the bottom back on in the scheme of things. but you will be painting the tank again!
 
1200ts said:
As of a couple of years ago here in the USA, methylene chloride was banned from use in paint removers.
Click to expand...
Here in Idaho, both Acetone and Methylene Chloride are stocked on the shelf at my local Home Depot. Keep in mind that in Idaho you can open-carry a firearm, and you do not need a permit, so toxic chemicals are good to go.
Is there any way to tell if the liner is epoxy or ? I will try the acetone first.

'Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition'
 
78jotadave said:
Here in Idaho, both Acetone and Methylene Chloride are stocked on the shelf at my local Home Depot. Keep in mind that in Idaho you can open-carry a firearm, and you do not need a permit, so toxic chemicals are good to go.
Is there any way to tell if the liner is epoxy or ? I will try the acetone first.

'Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition'
Click to expand...
20 paces should do it........... :ROFLMAO:
 
I
piranha-bro2 said:
If nothing truly clears ALL the liner crap out I reckon I'd be cutting the bottom out of the tank and doing the job thoroughly. It's no bighie to reweld the bottom back on in the scheme of things. but you will be painting the tank again!
Click to expand...
I think I posted this elsewhere, but this will give the opportunity to remove the hideous seam at the lower edge of all fuel tanks. God I hate that!
 
Alzero, doing Helo stuff don't they run a bladder in their tanks? Are those bladders paintable like the membranes used to waterproof bathrooms? Is there any application in that for bike tanks? I think the Military run bulletproof bladders, self-sealing as well. I did some Googling, no mention of paintable. It didn't appear to be anything useful for our applications, other than that foam blocks to stop surging under cornering and braking. I have seen lots of long-distance Adventure types using packable bladders to extend fuel range, way better than a Jerry Can.
en.wikipedia.org

Self-sealing fuel tank - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
Last edited:
Vince said:
Alzero, doing Helo stuff don't they run a bladder in their tanks? Are those bladders paintable like the membranes used to waterproof bathrooms? Is there any application in that for bike tanks? I think the Military run bulletproof bladders, self-sealing as well. I did some Googling, no mention of paintable. It didn't appear to be anything useful for our applications, other than that foam blocks to stop surging under cornering and braking. I have seen lots of long-distance Adventure types using packable bladders to extend fuel range, way better than a Jerry Can.
en.wikipedia.org

Self-sealing fuel tank - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
Click to expand...
Military tanks use self sealing bladders, civilian helos use bladders too, but thinner and lighter weight since they don’t have the self sealing capability. When I was in flight test on the C-17 and also an inspector on commercial jets, they all have riveted wet wings filled with fuel. They use a two part polysulfite sealant to stop leaking. When being built all rivets and HiLoc fasteners are installed wet with sealant and all parting surfaces are buttered with sealant.

The sealants were known as Pro-seal 890 and on the C-17 it was PR-1422. If you google them you will see that they are both class B fuel tank sealants. And both made by PPG corp. I’d use either of those in a heartbeat to coat a fuel tank before any motorcycle product. The 1422 is also available in a thinner sprayable version called 1490 IIRC, it would be suitable for coating a bike tank.

Funny story: T-1, the first C-17 built and the first to fly, my bird, was rushed through assembly in order to meet deadlines and progress payments. So they did a terrible job of sealing the tanks and they leaked profusely. The flight test crew tried to repair them several times with no luck. Eventually McDonnell Douglas called in a team of tank specialists: all little people! The average seemed to be about 1m tall. They were small enough to get all the way to the wingtips past all the convoluted baffles and find and fix the leaks.

Not so funny tank story: during production there were two lazy guys who always used to crawl into the wing tanks and take naps to avoid work.They did it on one day in which we closed up the access panels and filled the tanks for the very first time with a special light oil called Golden Bear. Their foreman noticed they never clocked out that afternoon but thought nothing of it. It was only when we defueled and went back inside to fix the many leaks that their bodies were found. We fueled through a 5” line @ 80psi, so it came in pretty quick, I can only imagine what it was like to wake up to that. BTW their hands and nails were all broken up…..l
 
Last edited:
Alzero said:
Not so funny tank story:
Click to expand...
Fukking hell! That's worse than the true stories of little childrens' skeletons being found in the hulls of large rivetted steel ships a hundred plus years ago! How could something like that happen in a modern aircraft facility?! I hope there were healthy law suits to compensate the families ...
 
piranha-bro2 said:
Fukking hell! That's worse than the true stories of little childrens' skeletons being found in the hulls of large rivetted steel ships a hundred plus years ago! How could something like that happen in a modern aircraft facility?! I hope there were healthy law suits to compensate the families ...
Click to expand...
Yes, they got paid compensation for the loss of their useless lazy turds of a husband. People were freaked out, but there was a certain amount of “good riddance, the useless fucks got what they deserved”……… A good lead man lost his job too for not keeping track of them. They were from another part of the production line, inside the building. The aircraft was outside about 250m from their work station. They thought they had found the perfect place to hide from their lead and to get paid to sleep!
 
Not so nice tank story.

Maritime education insists on following pre prepared protocols and ‘enclosed space procedures’.
Failure to do so resulted in a submarine engineer being shut in a torpedo tube.
He was found suffocated when an extensive search to find him took place.

At least his family had a body to bury.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top