Over the last couple of weeks we have had a mixture of very rainy days, and then 5 beautiful days. We don't get many, low humidity, low 70's, clear skies days here in the Houston area. I did manage to get the freshly exposed metal painted before the rain started and it had dried enough to where it wasn't affected by the weather. I also decided to paint the tank reinforcement pieces ("cross sills" that attach to the tank flange) since I saw some flash rusting on them. I brush painted them with Rust Encapsulator from Eastwood - and because of the rain I decided not to spray paint another coat so I wouldn't get overspray on my Harley. Besides, if you crawl up under Rusty and notice the color difference, I'll be happy to explain.
So yesterday I headed out to the garage, but my first priority was to wash my bike. That takes me between 3 and 4 hours since I detail it each time. Afterwards, I had a couple of hours before daylight would expire, so I went back to work on the gas tank. However, the next thing that I did was to mount the rear shocks. I had the new mounting bolts and wanted to get them mounted so I wouldn't have to work around the tank later on. Also, I put in some bolts on the bracket that holds the rear leaf spring shackles from where I had to remove the rivets when cutting out the rear cross member.
Now that the rear cross member was dry from the touch-up painting. I did a trial fit to see how everything would line up. I noticed an immediate problem - the rear cross member won't fit flush with the rear of the frame rails. With that said, I should now explain, in better detail, the pieces that comprise this Mustang tank kit: (also see the picture to the top right)
- The tank itself is rectangular shaped with a flange on all 4 sides. The tank slides perfectly in between the frame rails with the flange resting in the frame rail leaving about a 1/2" gap between the flange edge and the outside frame wall. Technically, I guess you could just mount the tank "as is".
- There is also a square tube length of metal and a c-channel piece for both the front and rear sides of the tank that act as a cross sill. The bottom square tube has been drilled and tapped for a 5/16" bolt, while the c-channels have 5/16" holes drilled through the bottom edge.
- The idea is that the square tube acts as a bottom support, with the front (or rear) tank flange resting on it, and the the c-channel sits on top if the flange, making a sandwich if you will. The holes drilled in the flange and the c-channel match-up to the threaded holes on the bottom square tube. The overall height of the "sandwich" is the inside height of the frame rail. The tank will not jump around inside the frame rail.
I hope that makes sense! The tank should be installed forward enough to where you can remount the rear cross member flush with the end of the frame rails. Now for the problem - this means that the tank setup will have to slide to within a inch or so of the shock-mount cross member. Of course that cross member is mounted just like all the others, meaning that it sits inside the frame rails and uses rivets to hold it in place. This causes a clearance problem because I just lost 1/16" of an inch for the thickness of the cross member, not to mention that the rivet heads are going to be a problem.
The best solution I can think of is to cut out part of the square tubing to allow for the rivet head(s) to slide through. To compensate for that other 1/16", I decided to grind down the square tubing a little bit. I don't think this will effect the structural integrity too much....
At this point, it was close to dark, so I did well to get the front piece mounted in and all bolted together. The hardest part of this is lining all the holes up with such a tight fit. I was able to get the rear piece mounted inside the frame rail and I forced the whole thing up to the "trouble spot". You should note that when assembling the front pieces, you have to leave yourself enough room to get a wrench on the bolt head, and then work the tank in place afterwards. Hey, at least I got to use my "stubby" wrenches I purchased when working on the oil pump!
By this time it was definitely dark, and dinner was ready so I had to walk away.
November 15, 2004
Found some time this past weekend to work on the gas tank after all my other chores. I started right where I left off, but got nowhere fast. I just couldn't get the square tubing to get past that trouble spot. I spent some time trimming or grinding down small amounts of the tubing, but never got anywhere. I finally just ground down the rivet heads that where in the way. If I couldn't punch the other ones out with ease, then I think this will be fine, plus I didn't grind them all the way down.
Anyways, once I had that figured out, I used the rubber mallet to coax the tank up as far as it would go. Unfortunately, I was still about 2 inches shy of where I though I needed to be. Luckily, the rear of the frame rails seem to be a little taller and the rear cross-member set on the outside of the square support tubing and inside the frame rail. Since I had to drill holes for the relocated rear cross-member, I just had to punch a hole through the c-channel support. Walla, the gas tank is in.
I sprayed a little cleaner on the tank and surrounding frame areas and rubbed out the rubber mallet marks. All that remains for an operational gas tank is to run the fuel lines and create a sending unit out of a stock unit and the Ford unit. But the hard part is over....right?
On to the next Chapter...
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