Following up from the fuel pump post.....

Today I pulled out the fuel tank.
Not terribly tricky...... Okay.. it was.

** Question **
In the top of the tank there seems to be a small pipe. Whats it for? Vacume??
** End question **

Unhooking the filler nozzle from the rubber was irritating and annoying.
But the worst bit was unhooking the two pipes under the tank.

First thing first.
One starts in the rear by removing the spair and cover from the tank. Then unhooking the variouse tubes. Undoing the two straps that hold the tank down is pretty simple....
But to get the thing out you need to unhook the two fuel pipes.....

Not easy... From under the vehicle your supposed to remove the two split pins and the pipe ends should just drop from the tank.... Yea... good luck with that one.
Theres very little room to work in, or see. Unless you have the car on a lift, thats going to cause you some issues.

I eventualy broke the return pipe (at the fitting.. so I can fix that easily) and had enough play in the feed pipe to get to it and pull the pin before any damage was done.
Pondering for a moment I decided that when replacing the tank I would add in a length of pipe to the return side to make the process easier in the future.

Now....
Emptying the tank.. After pulling the two pipes from the bottom I expected the remaining gas to flow out.... it did not. I discovered about a gallon of gas that just sits in the tank and doesnt go down the feed tubes. This was just poured away though, through the filler pipe.

Inspecting the gas I saved I didnt see too much rust there either.... However!... I did see that there was about 1/4 of a gallon of mystery fluid....
The gas had sepperated from it.... (see attached).
So Im thinking that perhaps this icky nasty fluid was the cause of my troubles.
Carrying on, I flushed the tank with water and watched for rust, but saw none... (happy bunny about that).

Next is to fix the pipe, replace the tank, filler it up and go for a spin! :-)

 

im glad you posted this...I made a post below trying to figure out where feed and return lines were. *under car* duh, I think this 100 degree weather has effected my brain.

 

Congrats Adrian, you are now a member of the 'Grit in your eyes XJ40 tank fuel lines replacement' club.

 

Yea, its still sitting in bits right now.
But in the AM... I have 2 hours free to reinstall the tank.

Ya know, the problem is when the fuel line is an issue and you cant get the engine to run. Your stuck with a jack.... :-\
But most of my work will be in the back of the car. Just the last few minutes will be in the hooker position.

Im excited and worried all at the same time.
Im still conserned about that line that runs into the top of the tank itself....