"Crap" in the gas tank.

[Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL)]

I pulled the gas tank out of my Model A this weekend. Man, was it full of "crap"! I thought it was rust, but it was non-magnetic (I thought I might get some it out with a magnet). We proceeded to shake all of the loose stuff out of it. It was red in color. The only thing I can think of is dirt. It looked like red Georgia clay! There were some chunks 3/8" thick and 1" to 2" in diameter. There must have been a quart of it in there. Believe it or not, the car was running before I started the restoration. Has anyone ever found anything like this in a gas tank? What was it?

[Guest]

I have seen it before, I think it is old dried up gas residue. Is it all gummy or hard and crumbly?

[Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL)]

Hard and crumbly.

[Guest]

Hmmm. Could be some kind of old lining that they used in the gas tank that is drying up and crumbling apart. The stuff I found in one of my old tanks was chunky but gummy and mushy.

[Guest Hal Davis (MODEL A HAL)]

This stuff ranged from fine dust, through small flakes maybe a 1/4" in diameter, to the large chunks I mentioned before. I knocked on the bottom of the tank to loosen up anything that was stuck to it. I hope I got it all. I intend to put a gas tank sealer in there and coat the entire inside. I hope I have it clean enough to do that. I'll have to see what the manufacturer recommends when I get the sealer.

[Guest BruceW]

Clogged gas tanks are very common in a Model A especially when the car has been sitting a long time. The stuff had probably been in your tank a long time, maybe before the car's restoration and just recently broke loose.

Im not surprised it was running before. That just means that the guck had not reached the gas tank outlet yet.

Fuel tanks on Model As that have been sitting around usually will have something in them.. either gunk from plain old dirt or rust, old gas, ..or sometimes the gas guage float will desintagrate into a gooey mess. I guess its possible that clay dust could have gotten into the tank when the cap was off and eventually built up over the years. Best thing is to remove the tank and clean it thoroughly. Some people use a lye type cleaner.. or a commercially available cleaner.. other simply put small stones or a length of chain in the tank with water ands slosh it around to break up the old stuff. There are some good sealers to line the tank with after cleaning it and keep rust on the inside walls from disloging. Most Model A vendor carry fuel tank cleaner and sealer in size for the Model A tank. There is also a long, fine mesh filter that installed in the tank on the outlet to keep the opening from being completely cloggged and stopping fuel flow.

The same thing happened to me with our 31 after I had bought it. The car had sat in a garage for 12 or 15 years without being driven. Until I was able to take the tank out to clean it, I carried a small plastic football pump in the car. The car would be running down the road.. suddenly loose power and stop. I would take out my trusty wrench.. undo the fuel line at the carb, place the end of the pump on the line.. and give one good pump. It sufficiently blew the gunk back away from the tank outlet that the fuel could flow and the car could be driven home.

[Guest Dave Mills]

I found the same stuff in the gas tank on my '28. It really messed up the vacuum tank. I have had the car for 14 years and never cleaned it out. No telling how old the residue was.

[Guest brh]

This probably doesn't apply but we bought a 34 Olds and kept filling the fuel filter full of crud. Turns out back then the tank sending unit used cork and the cork was falling apart.

[Guest stude8]

What is happening is the modern fuels have all kinds of detergents for the benefit of fuel injection equipped cars and it is really loosening up all the old crud from dried up old time fuels, dead leaves and what ever migrated into your tank over the years. STude8