photo story of custom gas filler.....

[John Fabris]

Hi All,

Here are a few shots of what I had to do to create the gas filler for the rear stake pocket of a fleetside bed....

I brought the gas filler assembly from a marine supply store for $50. (there are several kinds, mine has a center section that pops up down pressed, then you can unscrew it)

The filler houseing is round, you can see where I cut it down to fit within the opening of the enlarged stake pocket.

What is not pictured is a small hose nipple that I welded onto the filler housing that is about 2 inches below the top of the bedside. This is for the displacement of air when you are filling the tank. Also, depending on how you place this within the pocket, you need to consider the placement of the hose clamp so you can access it from the hole that the tailgate tang goes into. Also consider how much room to clear the tailgate tang or cut the tang down a little bit....
There is the piece of metal that is the stop or the bottom for the stake pocket. When I opened up the hole at the top of the pocket, then I used a chisel and hammer to knock out this stop. It is held on by spot welds, and you make get lucky and have it pop right off if the spot welds are not that deep (as in the case with mine).

I also made sure that when the cap is tight, it lines up with the bedside...








Here is a shot of the lower bedside with the 1-1/2" fillerhose and air hose hanging out. I used a 90degree bend of exhaust pipe from a local shop to make the turn at the bottom of the hose.


Here is a shot of the rear bed crossmember and you can see what I had to remove to provide clearance for the gas hose..


Two finished shots...





I also changed the way that my gas tank filler hose and air vent hose came out from the tank. If you look at a factory 67-72 suburban tank (or 69-72 blazer tank), the filler tube exits the tank at a 90 degree, or straight out towards the driver side, I changed my to angle back towards the rear driver side stake pocket. this was done by cutting and rewelding the tube, and allowed me to have no bends in the gas filler hose. I then moved the air vent tube, which is located in front of the gas filler tube on the tank, to the rear of the tank, or behind the filler tube, just to make it easier to access and install the hose onto this vent.

One other thing to consider, since these types of filler caps are not vented, you may run into vacumn lock of your fuel. This is where no air can get into tank, and as your driving, the fuel pump is pulling fuel out of the tank, it then creates a vacumn in the tank, and when it builds, pretty soon your pump cannot pull anymore fuel out. Hence the use of vented cap on our trucks!! What I did to resolve this was to buy a $7.00 vacumn ball vent from a local motorcross shop. These go onto the hose of a gas cap for dirtbikes to allow the intake of air, but because they have a spring and ball bearing inside, nothing can come out, kinda like a one way ball valve...
I just simply drilled a hole in the top of the tank, and expoxied the vent into place. Now air in be sucked in when needed, but I still have a closed system.
Picture of these vent from ebay....




Have any questions, let me know..... I can take more pictures as needed.

[cdowns]

that turned out to be a nice clean job

WELL DONE

[Jimbotronics]

Thanks John! I like that setup alot.

[Pickles]

very nice job, and thanks for the info on how to do this

[junkyardjohn]

Wow John... Thats Really Clean Looking. Nice Job. I Can See I'll Be Incorporating This Mod. Into My Current Project. Thank You . John

[Chevyman680063]

That looks nice. I bet you'll get some strange looks when pumping gas because people are probably going to think you're pumping gas into the bed.

[jocko]

Originally Posted by Chevyman680063

That looks nice. I bet you'll get some strange looks when pumping gas because people are probably going to think you're pumping gas into the bed.

I was just thinking the same thing.

VERY cool upgrade, I must say.

[67ChevyRedneck]

Nice write-up and nice job. Also, thanks for the help with the venting, I'm using the same thing john is using on my truck with a blazer tank and silverado fuel door

[Canadian694x4]

Well Done!

[LUV2XCLR8]

I want one

[LUV2XCLR8]

I saw some of them, I was wondering if it was my puter

[John Fabris]

Cool, I can blame it on you then Luv...

[chevy_fatman]

It sounds cool, I'll check back when the pics come back

[junkyardjohn]

HAH... I FINALLY DECIDED TO COPY THE WHOLE THING BEFORE THE SERVER TOOK A SH!T. JOHN

[chevy_fatman]

I see the pics now, great job!

[jaros44sr]

Nice work, looks as good as the rest of your truck, cool mod. One question, could those vents be used on my diffs. I lost one and can't find a replacement BTW I found it when I cut the grass now I have a 3 pc. vent cap

[Jerry Jones]

John that is awsome! Maybe one of these days I will be able to see it in person (my tuesdays and wednesdays have been nuts since we talked last). My wife is really wanting to get up there and I cant seem to get my work done in time to make it up.

[John Fabris]

jaros44, they are a one way valve, so while it would work when the rearend is cooling down, it would not work while it is heating up, and you would more then likely have gear oil leak as the air heats up and forces its way out of the seals....

Jerry, No biggie on time, life is what it is.... I will be heading out to Antioch tommorow to the BilletProof show at the fairground, should be a cool show for the traditional rat rod crowd....

[jugernot]

John,

Thanks for responding to my PM. I have a brand new bed from Mar K. It is still in boxes, but I found a pic on the Mar K site. My bed was a custom order with no stake pocket holes. The pocket goes all the was down.

[glock35ipsc]

I'm gonna use your idea on my 68...... cause you know just how much I hate your truck!

[John Fabris]

Ok. I went to Mar-K website to look at the pictures, and yes, I don't see why you can't do the same thing for your stepside fill as I did for my fleetside.

You should not have to worry about the tailgate tang as I mentioned in the post. You do have to consider how you are going to attach the gas filler hose to the gas filler assembly as you will not have the opening (in the case of the fleetside, the tail gate tang hole) to access a hose clamp. To correc that, just attached the hose before you weld, and weld very slow and let it cool down in between welds so you don't melt the rubber filler hose. As for the bottom of the stake pocket of the stepside, I do not know what you will need to do without seeing one in person, or you posting a photo of the bottom. I do know of a 67 step side nearby, and I can try to stop by it and look at it this weekend....

Back to my beer!!!!

[Gimix]

Very nice,but i have always been afraid of doing anything like this because of static electricity on hot sunny days.Can anyone clear this for me?

[jimmydean]

Man, that looks awesome! I wish I could do something like that, but I use my stake pockets. That is a very clean look.

[jaros44sr]

Thanks John for the info. aleast they solve my venting problem in my tank, didn't know what to do to fix that. Jim

[John Fabris]

Gimix, Unless you are rubbing all over your cloth interior while you are filling up, you won't have a problem with static electricity.

Even then, touching the truck or the pump itself with your hand to release the charge before removing the nozzle will take care of that.....

And for those that worry about the spark created when you turn your lights on or when you apply the brakes, my set up is a sealed system and even if I were to have sloppy wireing or loose fitting lightbulbs, it would not be an issue...