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So, needed/wanted to cleanup 2pr of gas tanks for my two cars. Over the years I had/acquired a total of 12 gas tanks (it was a nice pile in the attic) and thought to myself 'How hard could it be to just get them all restored ..." - so off I go on a project that started in April and I just completed yesterday (mid November, 8 months that seemed to last forever). I already had these gas tanks, so dragged them out of the attic, pulled off old hoses, clamps, sending units, spiders, etc. and piled then into the back of the car .. away I go, the project begins. Had all tanks: A) hot tanked/flushed/muriatic acid tanked then neutralized (outsourced at metal stripping company for approx.. $50/tank which sounded OK at the beginning and was assuming I could sell 8 to help pay for this, but wait ... b) now in case you did not know, time is not friendly to Sunbeam gas tanks and only 7 tanks survived this first step (found some pin holes for sure) and purchased a 13th tank from friend for $50 to end up with 4 pairs. Repeated same process on this 13th tank. Now I have 8 good, clean bare metal gas tanks (4 pair) looking great with only a very light surface rust inside from step A. Also I quickly know my economics to recoup costs for this project are slipping away. Plugged up each tank (did this one at a time) and poured in about 1/2 gallon of EvapoRust, sloshing around by shaking and flipping end/side/etc. over and over for about 4 hours on each side (took a while) - then flush with warm soapy water twice each then quickly plugged/flushed again with Acetone to pull out the water which worked great to end up with a nice clean shiny metal inside. C) plugged/filled each with about 1 quart of Red-Kote gas tank lining product, flipped tank over and over to get all sides (did two tanks at a time and took about 20 minutes per tank), then poured out excess Red-Kote and able to reuse on multiple tanks any excess. then D) sand, prime, spray paint each tank to protect the outside's . Long story short: project took 8 months to complete at a cost of about $135 each for the final 8 good tanks (excluding initial cost of the tanks purchased over the years in $25-$75 each range) Repair summary : started with 12 tanks, over 100 miles driven, found 5 tanks bad, purchase another tank and repeat, (2) gallons of EvapoRust, (1.5) gallons of Acetone, (3) quarts of Red-Kote tank cleaner and and guess 80+ hours of my time. In conclusion, if it looks easy and/or inexpensive .. then it probably will not turn out as you plan - HA! All good, just thought you might get a kick out of my gas tank restoration adventur
