Gas tank fuel line enlarged

For starters I am surprised your tank does not have a drain.
I had to get a new sending unit which is the later style with a built-in 1/4" fuel pick-up line. My plan is to use the stock 1/4" line and join it together with the new 1/4". I don't have the fittings yet so I can't tell you how it works yet....just my idea for now.
Jason Eaton fabricated a nice fuel pick-up. You can see it on his website.
http://www.jasoneaton.net/2003...ply-and-switche.html

John

You're right to worry, Snoopy. Most guys know that with more than stock power you need more than stock fuel flow. Racers use 1/2" ID lines to increase the fuel flow for big engines. Somewhere around 450 real horses in a Pantera- and more than 5500 rpms- will run a carb (or 2) lean when fed by the stock fuel line. The early one with the banjo is arguably worse than the later one. FWIW, the stock line measures less than 1/4" [0.200"ID] thanks to the swedged restriction on the top to keep hoses from sliding off-which seldom happens.
I just finished a conversion using 3/8" gas line on a late sender for a friend, which increased his fuel flow by over 36%. Full details in the June POCA News now in the mail. The cost of brand new senders has dropped in recent months, too. The late sender is a pure bolt in to your early tank.

To answer your question, yes that would work fine.

quote:

I am surprised your tank does not have a drain.

The early cars did not have a tank drain.

John

If it is agreed I can use the vent plate I will just use that for fuel and vent. If I can go to a half inch tube I might as well go big so I can upgrade all my fuel lines if necessary. Right now I am running -6 lines. I am thinking the small tube in the tank and the banjo are my restrictions, but maybe it's the whole thing. I figure if I get a half inch line in the tank I can start replacing the remaining restrictions one at a time. We started realizing the restriction when we hit about 385HP at the wheels on a Mustang Dyno.

Maybe I'm not searching the forums properly but I can't find much on this subject. I would think it would be more common and the vent seems to be the easiest fix for any fuel lines into the tank.

quote:

Originally posted by Snoopy: Is there any reason I can't use the vent plate on the tank to fabricate a plate with a vent and fuel source using larger 1/2 tubing so I can get an adequate amount of fuel to the fuel pump and carb?

I did just that on one of the previous incarnations of my car; that is, fabbed a 1/2" diameter assembly to that installs where the stock vent cap formerly resided. It's still installed.

Here's the assembly:



I added the vent tube and you cant see it but the 90 degree -8 bulkhead fitting nut and jam nut are tacked in place. I don't recall for sure but minimum diameter though the fittings was about ~.390" though it does have an abrupt 90 degree turn in the bulkhead which is bound to cause some head loss.



Here it is installed. I left the original pick up installed because it mounted the sender and just capped off the stock fuel pick up. It supported a stroker engine that was ~500 HP at the flywheel at 6krpm. Pretty sure I installed this while the tank was out of the car. Not sure but doubt it could be done in the car.



I've since added an electric fuel pump and when I did, I went to the set up below which removes fuel directly from the bottom of the tank. The car will eventually be injected at which time I'll swap the fuel pumps for the EFI pump. There are some pro's and cons to removing the fuel at this point. Some will say that it makes you more likely to suck bad fuel though I've never really understood this. If I should ever have bad fuel, I'd want it out of there any way. I'm a firm believer in the larger cannister type filters and inlet plumbing especially to feed electric pumps so you don't run them dry. IMO, most of the small inline filters have too much pressure drop or soon will after some use. Bosswrench will caution that this extraction point is more suspectible to damage from road trash. I installed an Earl's bulkhead shut off valve, pointed most of it forward, and tied it off through the bulkhead valve to the tank support. Even so, it's well above the frame rails. Suppose I could put a trash shield on it but it's not a track car and at my ride height I'd have some serious front end damage before anything made it to the fuel line.



Take care,
Kelly

Thanks for the reply and pics. That is just what I will do. I really appreciate the reply so I know Im not doing something stupid (as I sometimes do). I will do this and start re-plumbing everything for -8 lines.
Thanks again all..