Pinholes in gas tank

[Guest]

Just my luck. I clean out the tank in an effort to seem If i can run it without sealing the tank, now I see 3 pinholes in a row near the fuel petcock. Will jb weld work? Or what about permatex. I've never soldered before is that an option, also worst case scenario would a 80 550 tank fit

[Gorminrider]

I've used jbweld on pinholes. Worked fine. But you should stick it onto new,shiny metal so that means taking more paint off in the area and likely finding more pinholes ...It can turn into a mess if you are unlucky per the rust's progress.

area should be clean of any petro residue or finger-sweat too so clean well with alcohol or acetone

An experiment tthat I haven't tried would be "rust converter" applied to it in an attempt to keep the blob of jbweld smaller.

It's not a good idea to sand the blobs down "fair" to tank. jbweld needs some thickness for strength. You might even go so far as using an epoxy with glass matt which will cover more area in a stronger fashion and cosmetically easier to fair...

Painting over epoxies is another study.....but it's not too hard to make it long enough lasting if you are not persnickety?

At the least these patches might help if you do go forward with recoating the inside.

[Jonathan]

Re: Sanding epoxy pin hole repairs flush. Take a centre punch and create a gentle depression at each pinhole. Clean as per prev, fill with glue and sand flush.

[Nessism]

Best option is to JB Weld over the leaks and then fashion up some plugs for the petcock hole, fuel sender (if applicable) hole, and gas filler opening, and then fully derust the tank. There may be some more leaks that spring up during the derusting process so be mentally ready for that. Once you have the tank fully derusted then get some Caswell's tank sealer and have at it. The Caswell's sealer is thick and will help reinforce the metal which is thin and weakened at this point. Just be sure to fully derust before doing the sealer business.

[hannibal]

I used vinegar to derust the tank, but left it in the tank for more than 2 weeks. The vinegar worked great but made two rice grain sized holes in the tank. I put tape over the holes, then used Caswell tank sealer to line the tank. Then I used JB weld on the outside to seal the holes. It's been 2 years and the tank is still holding fuel without issue.

[Kman123]

Tank is and was rust free. I was removing kreem coating and trying to avoid using another sealer. I wonder, would power washer made those holes?

[Big T]

No, they are rust holes. Very common at the bottom if tanks left with fuel in them