| |
Bertram31.com General Bulletin Board
Good news/bad news about the fiberglass tanks!
Posted By: Rawleigh
Date: Monday, 17 April 2006, at 8:11 p.m.
I cut into the fiberglass fuel tank out of Mikey's '64(?) B31 which he took out as part of his renovatoion. The good news is its built like a brick s$#@ house. The bad news is its built like a brick S$#@ house!! Ther is no way it is going to come apart by just cutting off the flange as I had hoped! I'll try to get pictures when the light is better. The flange is glassed solid to the point that the thickened resin is one inch thick and extends back into the tank almost two inches! Evidently they put the tank down on the top in a heavy bead of thickened resin when they constructed it. The inside of the tank has a fabric weave with no gelcoat. The sides and top away from the flange are about 1/4" thick. The baffles are the same fiberglass and are tabbed in. I haven't cut through the top of one of the baffles yet, but it feels like they are set in the same thickened resin where they are recessed into the top. I will do further sectioning of the tank as time permits, but the prospect of being able to take the entire top off looks grim. Typical Bertram building technique! Got to love 'em even when it is making the fix difficult. Looks like each compartment will have to be accessed seperately as there is also a baffle down the middle. I believe that is 8 compartments. The only way I can see doing the job is to have bronze access ports made for each compartment like the two that are already on the tank but bigger. I guess they could be molded out of the alcohol resistant vinylester, but bronze might be just as easy unless someone were going to produce a runn of them. Expensive no matter how you do it. This stinks!! I will try to provide more info later in the week with pictures if possible. Rawleigh
| |
Bertram31.com General Bulletin Board is maintained by Patrick McCrary with WebBBS 5.12.