Geico266

Geico266

Well Known Member
I need some advice about rebuilding the fuel tank in the -12. I decided to pull the tank out and remove the site glass.

The question is, since the pro seal that is on the tank is only 5 month old and firm but plyable do I need to clean all of the old pro seal off before mating the parts again? The new pro seal will certainly stick to the old proseal. Removing it down to bare metal is a real PITA.

Any solvents remove cured proseal?

Thanks for any advice and recommendations in advance.
 
There are at least two professional ProSeal experts on VAF. Both are dealing with this stuff on a daily basis. One is an engineer with a factory producing the sticky and the other guy is a military chemist/technician (?) repairing fuel tanks and mixing the smelly every day. I spent a good amount of time a while ago trying to search for their posts and contacts but was not successful.

May be this thread gets their attention. I still have some questions forwarded unanswered.
 
Well, I figured out it is not hard to clean it off. I used a 90 degree die grinder and a 2" VERY rough Scotch Brite pad. I was able to clean off all of the parts in 5 mins.

Some times I over think things.
 
Proseal

I use a set of hobby chisles to cut sealant. The "U" shaped and 1/4 arc are my two favorites. I knock down the corners with a wetstone and pay carefull attention to have a sharp smooth bevel to preclude marking the aluminum. If you scrape proseal, all of it will need to come off because leaving some will leave a failed bond. Cutting eliminates that. There is no solvent that I know of that removes sealant. The bigger tank projects I have done were weeks long in DC-6's replacing lower doublers. Another one part product that I recomend is EC 776. About the same coler and consistancy as honey, it brushes on. I use where I suspect a problem with the sealant (corners, clusters of fasteners ect).
Andrew
 
I would use a plexiglass scraper and clean ALL the old proseal. Finish up by cleaning with MEK.
 
How long before you can add fuel to fresh pro seal? Instead of pressure checking it, for me it would be easier just to add fuel and let it sit for a day.
 
Once its starts to get firm you can put fuel on it. Assuming its B2 @ 70 degrees 24 hours should be plenty of time.
 
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