Cleaning Aux Fuel tank

[zmaster]

Hi All,

Pulled out my aux tank and found a layer of rusty crud on the bottom. Natrad offered to clean the tank for between $250 and $500, still better than the $1100 for a new one. They claim they cut holes in it to access all areas with a steam cleaner, then seal up. Has anyone had any experience with cleaning tanks, does it work? Any other suggestions?

[BigRAWesty]

Fark. Forget that. Why would you cut holes in a perfectly good tank and risk it leaking??
Remove the sender unit. It's a 100+mm hole. You'll easily get in there to clean it.
See if any of your mates have hot water high pressure cleaner and dig in.
If it's bad scrap and scrub first.

[zmaster]

have opened it up through sender and found baffles on both sides, can only access a small area.

[megatexture]

I'd take advantage of this Opportunity to upgrade to a long range tank that's 250-500 bucks towards a new one...

[zmaster]

Thanks for responses!

Have a long ranger main tank, but was hoping to save aux tank. Will give the electrolysis a go, could take a while but then have nothing to loose. Will set up power supply in the yard and an iron electrode and see how long it takes to clean.

[Winnie]

Fark. Forget that. Why would you cut holes in a perfectly good tank and risk it leaking??
Remove the sender unit. It's a 100+mm hole. You'll easily get in there to clean it.
See if any of your mates have hot water high pressure cleaner and dig in.
If it's bad scrap and scrub first.

No chance mate... There is very small amount of the tank you can clean, there are baffles in the way.
Mine had a little bit of surface rust and I scrubbed what I could with petrol but for the rest I just put a little bit of petrol in the bottom and swirled it around like a mad man. I did that several times and then once the tank was in the car I put a bit of petrol in it and went for a drive around the hills, got home and drained it. I just put a good filter on the tank and won't have any problems.

[Alitis007]

I've had about 3 tanks cleaned that had rust in them, they not only pressure test them but also acid dip and treat the steel with some thing that I can describe as an anti rust coating, sort of like a galvanising coating. If you add the cost of the chemicals and the labour involved that price isn't that much if you take all that into account

[zmaster]

Thanks Alitis007

Who cleaned your tanks?

[megatexture]

You can buy diy kits, not done it myself but cheaper than a new tank http://www.kbs-coatings.com.au/product/auto-fuel-tank-sealer-kit/

[Nightjar]

$250.00 to clean a tank?? Why?
Just swill some diesel around, empty and repeat several times, leave it upside down to dry out thoroughly.
Make sure you use your aux tank every fill, know of people who only use theirs for long trips and of course condensation forms in the tank followed by rust.
Keep it full of diesel and regular filter changes.
Fitted a water trap to my ute after several bad experiences with watered diesel at outback fuel stops.
Hard to believe they cut holes in tanks and the unsuspecting wallets.

http://i151.photobucket.com/albums/s122/nightjar3/R2132UAR2132PFilter002.jpg (http://s151.photobucket.com/user/nightjar3/media/R2132UAR2132PFilter002.jpg.html)

[mudski]

You can buy diy kits, not done it myself but cheaper than a new tank http://www.kbs-coatings.com.au/product/auto-fuel-tank-sealer-kit/

I used a similar kit on my old dirt bikes back in the day when they had steel tanks. :o

[BigRAWesty]

So as I've just found out my lra tank was used for petrol.
And I have scale in the bottom.
So onto google and found this.

http://youtu.be/fUYr_7SwGms

(Hopefully that works)
Cider vinegar. Yep. That's it pulls the scale right off. Quite amazing really. I'd say not to good for the heavy rust but any scale it does a good job.
Cheers