Removing Gas Tank

[Smurfmf84]

Hi all, this weekend I was planning on taking the gas tank off. I have a very old R4 and some of the screws are a little bit rusty. As most of you know the gas tank have 3 screws to hold it. The first two (on the same side) went smoothly, but the third one was hard to unscrew and ended up breaking something and now the screw, is twisting crazy (yo can unscrew but the screw twists loose with no grip, sorry but my english is not perfect and I miss some tech vocabulary). Problem is now I cannot get it off since is to unconfortable to reach from outside.

Do you have any ideas on how to get it off?.

Thanks in advance!

 

[barnfind]

Which screw is it exactly? I recall that you also need to remove the crossmember just in front of the spare wheel, before you can drop the tank out. The difficult one is the one at the front of tank in the middle which is a very long bolt, the top of which is under the rear seat. You need an assistant to put a spanner on one end.
Soak everything in releasing oil before you have another go, or you'll end up snapping things off, or rounding bolt heads off.

 

[Smurfmf84]

Hi barnfind, thanks for your quick reply! the screw is exactly the on that you mentioned ( the lonley very long one), and sadly I already broke something, and the screw is twisting easily but not unscrewing at all.

Do you have any ideas for that?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Geoff in the Gully]

Sounds like the long bolt has broken loose from its attachment inside the car under the rear seat. When this happened to me recently, I managed to get some locking grip pliers to hold on to it enough the get the nut off from underneath the car. But as Barnfind says, you need to give it a good soak with penetrating oil.

I replaced it with a bolt with a normal hex head on it so I could use a spanner on it next time. I used one of the bolts used to hold the rear suspension outer mounts to the chassis - the long one was just the right size.

Geoff

 

[Smurfmf84]

Hi, I cannot get to the attachment from inside the car, and as the gas tank is still there I cannot grab it from underneath the car :S. I'm thinking I will remove the torsion bars, let the tank bend on one side by removing the other 2 screws and going over the tank to grab the third screw attachment with a plier. Do you think that kind of work around would work?.

Thanks for all the tips you are giving !


Regards

 

[Rutger-peer]

My GTL doesn't have a long bolt that goes all the way into the chassis, instead it's got a little bracket which holds one of those slide-on screwthread clips. You can see it in this picture:

You say you have a really old R4 so it might be different on those ones. But if not, than probably the thread of that clip has gone twisted and with some force you might be able to pull the bolt out or twist it out is you are able to find a way of both pulling it towards you and unscrew it at the same time.

If anyone gets what I mean .

You slide that clip on and that provides the thread into which that third bolt screws.

Y

 

[Smurfmf84]

Rutger! thanks a lot for the pic! it helps a lot to guess what it should have there, I will try your suggestion and then will post a picture of the result (probably a lot more rusty than yours!)


Thanks again!

 

[DavidN]

It must be some clipped on square nut that came loose and is now free spinning.
It's pretty tight in there.
Here are 2 pictures of my 1985 F6.

Hope that helps (a bit)!

 

[angel]

Make 100% sure that the screw you are trying to loosen does not continue through the chassis in the car (as people here already said) before getting to the trouble of removing the torsion bars.
Fully fold the rear seat, lift the rubber mat, and you will immediately see the joint between the chassis and body. You will notice a series of bolts along it, the central one is the through-bolt holding the fuel tank on most R4s. It should have a 13mm head, while all others should be 11mm. Check with the help of an assistant if it rotates when you are trying to undo the nut from below.