Is this rare

[cfan10]

Quick question I have an 84 Chevy swb 305/th350 and I am wondering how common dual tanks is in this year or any '81-'87 for some reason I thought mine was pretty rare.

Many thanks for answering my question!

[Willowrun]

I have 3 '84 trucks.
C10 SWB has a single tank.
K10 SWB dual tanks
C20 crew dual tanks

[maxx442]

I've had six 82-87 square bodies over the years. All of them but one had dual tanks.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by cfan10

Quick question I have an 84 Chevy swb 305/th350 and I am wondering how common dual tanks is in this year or any '81-'87 for some reason I thought mine was pretty rare.

Nope.

K

[sweetk30]

just got a 87 2wd with long bed and 2 tanks . . . factory used what they had that day and it got 2 short bed 16 gal tanks . . .

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by sweetk30

just got a 87 2wd with long bed and 2 tanks . . . factory used what they had that day and it got 2 short bed 16 gal tanks . . .

Negative.

The tank size was a function of GVW as well. If two 20 gallon tanks full of fuel pushed you over the weight rating then two 16 gallon tanks were required.

K

[sweetk30]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

Negative.

The tank size was a function of GVW as well. If two 20 gallon tanks full of fuel pushed you over the weight rating then two 16 gallon tanks were required.

K

so for around 50 lbs with 8 gal extra fuel and little extra tin on gas tank size . . . wow that just blows my mind . . .

i have never seen one like this so i figured for last year they used what they had .

no matter as its now got 2 new 20 gal tanks in it .

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by sweetk30

i have never seen one like this so i figured for last year they used what they had .

The assembly plant doesn't just "use what they had".

The whole "assembly line running out of parts so the line workers just did a substitution" concept is a bit overplayed. I've only seen it happen a couple times in almost 40 years and in those few instances it there was enough lead time to make a decision or design a recovery plan. It was never spontaneous and it was never done by the plant alone. There was upper management and engineering involvement to wring out all the legal and regulatory implications and to make sure all affected parties were in agreement before proceeding.

Part substitutions are not made spontaneously largely because of the downstream assembly implications (especially if there are multiple areas or electrical involved). Making even a minor change can disrupt the subsequent operations due to different attachments, clips, routings, connections, etc. So - you wouldn't want to install a smaller fuel tank only to find out later that the sending unit doesn't work, or register the fuel gage correctly, or that the system has not been validated for commerce. There is a strong aversion to shutting the line down, not only as a result of this but for any reason at all.

Most assembly plants (not all, but most) have an accumulator between body shop and paint, and another between paint and trim. This allows the banking of bodies to keep the final line running in the event of a breakdown or work stoppage upstream. It also allows the shuffling of builds for final line work balance (ie, can't have to many stick shifts in a row, can't have too many A/C jobs in a row, can't have too many sunroofs or cab running lights in a row) but also allows the plant to remove builds from the mix if there is a particular part shortage.

Lastly - That's a Federal Trade Commission violation and is federally regulated if there is a difference in price between the two options. In other words, if a customer pays for something they have to get it. For example, if the customer were to order a trailer hitch (and pay for it) and not receive one, or paid for larger fuel tanks but got smaller ones, then GM would be open to legal action, including fines, penalties and a potential recall or field action forced by the FTC.

K

[Tiger Joe]

random question, and maybe Keith knows- did all tbi trucks get 16 gal tanks regardless of short or long? I seem to remember there was an issue when we restored my 87 with the tanks and it is a long bed with the short tanks

[Mattchu60]

My 87' TBI long bed 4x4 came with factory dual 16 gallon tanks as well. Also seems like I can only get 10-11 gallons out of them before the gauge is reading at 1/8th full.

[RyanNewberry]

My 87 that I plow with has dual tanks, one big and one small, I assume it came new that way but I’m not promising it.

[csdineley]

My 87 2wd long bed came with dual 20 gal tanks

[duallydude63]

My 91 crewcab/dually had 2 20 gal tanks!!!

[ElGracho]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

The assembly plant doesn't just "use what they had".

The whole "assembly line running out of parts so the line workers just did a substitution" concept is a bit overplayed.

...

K

Very happy to hear this explained. I hear all the time how the factory "used leftovers" or mostly started in year x but my uncle had that 2 years before. Etc. Etc.

When it comes to these trucks, I've never seen the year to year change rules broken. Gas doors started on pickups in 79, first year of high back buckets was 77 and etc. People make a lot of claims but they don't pan out.

[D13]

I actually shut down a plant one night becuse we ran out of a certain brake rotor / pad combo and there were a lot of them on the line.

Bolts and nuts, we might substitute, if the replacement was as good or better performance and fit. Anything more than that woudl be uncommon.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by Tiger Joe

random question, and maybe Keith knows- did all tbi trucks get 16 gal tanks regardless of short or long? I seem to remember there was an issue when we restored my 87 with the tanks and it is a long bed with the short tanks

Nope.

Originally Posted by RyanNewberry

My 87 that I plow with has dual tanks, one big and one small, I assume it came new that way but I’m not promising it.

Nope!! The tanks always matched side to side.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by D13

I actually shut down a plant one night becuse we ran out of a certain brake rotor / pad combo and there were a lot of them on the line.

Reminds me of an incident we had launching the Volt program.

In the Hamtramck plant the first place the new content would hit would be the IP line, where the dash assembly was built up and the instrument cluster, radio, HVAC controls, etc, would be installed. We would hang out there in order to get an early look at how the options were broadcasting.

One time I was standing there with my plant host, the plant planner, and the line stopped. Naturally I’m a bit sensitive to when it goes down so I cut into our conversation abruptly and asked “why are we down?”

"Uh – we’re on break” he said, looking around nervously.

“Good” I said. “I wanted to make sure it wasn’t my fault”.

HA HA, right?

In about two minutes my host comes running over, all in a huff. “SEYMORE!” he says. “We’re not on break; we're down on the IP line and IT’S YOUR FAULT!”.

A bit surprised at this sudden change of status I sauntered over and there was a crowd of neckties around the radio install. The line superintendent (the foreman's boss) was there and took the opportunity to show boat a bit by ripping me a new one about engineering changes, and how stupid engineers are, and how disruptive temporary changes are, etc. It was in that supportive environment I had to figure out what was going on. It seemed that one of the inspection features had the line shut down, the symptom being that as the operator tried to scan one of the bar codes the reader didn’t recognize it as the right part and stopped the line. After a couple minutes I asked her to show me what she was doing.

“I’m scanning this” she said “but it won’t go.”

That’s when I noticed she was scanning the wrong bar code; Operator error. I showed her the uplevel part number and code and when she hit that with the laser reader “…whirrrrrr” everything spun back to life. The crowd quietly disbursed and everybody went back to whatever they were doing.



I just thought it was funny that it was "wasn’t my fault/was my fault/wasn’t my fault". Never got an apology for being unjustly accused, either...

At any rate, in 40 years, I don't think I have ever intentionally stopped the final line, even when I was a production supervisor. And - it can be pretty lonely at 5 minutes before 6 am when it's just you, your quality man and a couple of your favorite assemblers standing around waiting for the line to start up for the day.

K

[RyanNewberry]

Nope!! The tanks always matched side to side.[/QUOTE]

Then I guess not haha, I wasn’t sure, but I thought I’ve heard from a number of people that half tons came with the different size tanks from side to side, chances are they are wrong also. The guy who worked at the actual plant probably knows best eh.