Fuel tank repair shop?

[8708]

Good morning!
I have a nose tank with a small hole next to the shutoff valve and a cracked seam. Can anyone recommend a shop for repairs? I have searched the threads but have not had any luck.
Thanks!
Jay
Midland, TX

[Ragwing nut]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

Sounds like you have a steel tank. Any radiator shop should be able to fix it and then i receommend a fuel tank sealant like MIL-8802-B1/2 applied over all the solder seams.

Mike

[Mark Julicher]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

Jay,
This same thing happened to me a while back on a wing tank. I wish I could recommend a repair shop, but the fellow that did this work for me is dead and gone, but here is the story of how I had mine repaired in 1985.

First of all, my tanks are the original terneplate, -- essentialy tinned steel, not aluminum like some of the newer ones. Not just any welder was willing to mess with this material. Second, because these were used fuel tanks, most of the welders I spoke with were totally un-interested because of the explosion hazard. Finally, after much looking around and asking a farmer friend of mine, I was introduced to your classic good-old-boy welder complete with bib-overalls, a shop out in the country, and a lot of used tractor parts lying around in various states of disrepair.

Now, this was in Arkansas where you just don't go up and tell the man what you want -- oh no -- that would be a serious breech of country etiquette. I sort of showed the shop owner my problem and wondered out loud if there was anybody around that could do such a repair and talked about the weather and such like that. Naturally every welder in the shop had to come by and offer an opinion about how the varnish in the tank would probably give off enough fumes to ignite and possibly ruin the tank and perhaps the welder also. And naturally I had to allow as how this did appear to be a difficulty that would require me to either find another tank or perhaps pay a fair premium if there was a welder somewhere that could actually do such serious and delicate work. So finally after a lot of palaver the old man that owned the shop, in a sort of cock-of-the-walk style, stated that he could probably figure it out if I left it with him a few days. Having no other ideas, I left it there and hoped for the best.

Well, I came back a week later and there was a beautiful repaired fuel tank. The old man explained that he took a garden hose and ran it from the exhaust on his pickup truck and into the tank and just let the truck pump hot gasses into the tank for a few hours until he figured it might be safe to strike an arc on that tank. So he hit the opening of the tank with a shot from his mig welder and it didn't blow up - naturally making him look like the veritable country genious that he was and ratchting up his legendary status among the other welders in his employment. I asked him how much I owed him and allowed as how there probably wasn't another welder in the county that could have done the job (this said loud enough for his employees to hear.) $25 later I was happily driving home with a repaired tank.

So there you are. I didn't solve your problem, but that is exactly how I repaired mine.

[Larry Lyons]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

LOL Jay, we had a radiator shop just like here. When you took him a tank or radiator, you walked in, said you had a slight problem, and you were going to leave it there for him to look at sometime when he had time. If he was not busy you could start talking airplanes or some such and before you left he usually had it fixed. But if you went in and said "Donnie I need this bad, right now, we are down while we wait for you to fix this here broken what ever" You would wait 2 days to a week for it. True story. Larry

[VictorBravo]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

Hey Spotter... that photo shows you smiling as if you know that F8U personally. You a Crusader driver?

[Larry Lyons]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

I was a plane captain in the Navy, got to know them way to well. I was in love then and still am. "When your out of Crusadres you are out of fighters" LOL Larry

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: Fuel tank repair shop?

"When your out of Crusaders you are out of fighters"

You got THAT right! I work where I see F-22 fly over all day and it looks like an alien invasion. The F-8 is an old love of mine too. Last fighter that LOOKED like a fighter and could hold it's own against anything it came up against, (even planes from the next two generations).
Hank