Body work and fuel filler flange

[Shawn Piper]

I’m having bodywork done on my 69 and noticed that my fuel filler flange was accidentally sandblasted and primered. I want to remove it and have it zinc plated because I don’t think paint will hold up to gasoline and friction by the gas cap. Upon inspection, it looks like it was pressed into place unlike the later styles. Does anyone have recommendations for removing it?
 

 

[John76]

Did you look in the trunk?

Remove the 4 bolts and the flange and the whole filler can be removed from the body.

 

[Shawn Piper]

That seems to be the later style. Mine is pressed in there and there aren’t screws to remove it. ?

[calw]

Right, the early style, which matches the very long fuel schnorkel and the tank with a very short neck, is different from the later style with bolt on parts at the filler, short rubber bit, and long tank neck.  It's not obvious how the early style was attached but it's a solid connection and the bit that the cap attaches to in the fender is surely NLA if it was EA ("Ever Available").

 

I have a similar situation- mine was painted instead of being masked, inside and out.  No sandblasting but still a mess.  I'm slowly abrading it away with various types of scraping after heavy masking, after deciding that removal and re-installation wasn't the thing to do.  I'm guessing small bits of paint that remain won't be a problem.  I hope!

 

It may be that you can install the later style using the same rear fender pressing, but I don't think the old version will come out without making a bodywork mess.

 

Careful polishing, particularly where the gasket on the cap makes contact should make a seal possible if you can get the paint off.

Think Dremel tool. 

 

Or, ask the painter "what were you thinking, and how do you plan on fixing this mess?"

[Mike Self]

You really don't want paint on the lip that forms the seal with the gas cap gasket; using the gas pump filler pipe will chip the paint, and those chips will eventually start to clog the mesh screen at the bottom of the pickup tube in the gas tank.  I would take a damp sponge or piece of flexible foam and plug the filler pipe (or remove the filler hose in the trunk and seal it off) then very carefully scrape the paint off that lip--use paint remover or lacquer thinner if the paint's fresh--just mask around the area so you don't mess up your fresh paint. A little fine steel wool will do a good job of removing the remaining paint and smoothing the metal.  

 

If your gas cap still has a cork gasket, get a rubber gasket to replace it.  And if it's really difficult to remove, take a polyethylene lid from a deli container, coffee can etc, and cut a second gasket to put under the rubber one.  It'll make removing the cap easy due to its inherent slickness.

 

mike 

[coloincaalpine RIP 2021]

Hi Shawn,

    If I were facing this issue, I would mask off heavily around the body hole and apply paint remover gingerly on the gas cap flange with a small brush and slowly remove the paint.  There are products like  POR 15 and Chassis Saver that come in silver and dry very hard and are resilient to fuel.  Not much you can do if the zinc was sandblasted off.

Dan 

[TobyB]

It's welded to the flange that's stamped into the quarter panel.

 

From experience, MODIFY IT.  It was a fire hazard from day one.

A gentle bump on the right rear corner,the sheet metal deforms,

and the boot pops off the flange. 

If your tank's full OR you make any sort of a left turn attempt,

the trunk fills with fuel, and runs around the tank 'seal' to the floor.

And drips onto the muffler.

 

5% chance of fire, at least!

 

Sure, sand the paint off the sealing surface, but then, on the back side,

either adapt to the later style or come up with a positive way to retain the original

(which is rather hard to do.)  Many change to a 'trunk fill' system, but that's kinda 

cumbersome, too.  Do note that the early system has a vent from the top of the

filler boot, so that'll need to be incorporated somehow, as well.

 

There are quite a few threads on this, but it's been a long time now.

 

For the 'that's not original' crowd, true:  Originally a percentage of these cars burned.

So I suppose the 'flambe' look WOULD be period correct.  If that's your thing...

 

t

 

[Shawn Piper]

I went back to the shop this weekend and explained my concerns. We aren’t so far along that we can’t do additional fabrication so they’re going to drill out the spot welds and I’ll have this piece plated again. I’ll let you all know how this turns out 

[TobyB]

Nice! 

 

If you can find the parts, the later system with screws works a lot better,

and is safer.   Unfortunately, it requires a later gas tank with the longer neck,

 

t

 

[Pdxguy]

On 7/12/2020 at 10:18 AM, TobyB said:

If you can find the parts, the later system with screws works a lot better,

and is safer.   Unfortunately, it requires a later gas tank with the longer neck,

If you have the older tank, could you use an adapter tube to bridge the gap from the end of the fuel filler and the neck of the tank?