Packard Forum Index » Post-War (1946-54)

The Packard had been sitting for years.Fuel was old and noticed a gray powdery substance in fuel bowl.I cleaned out the fuel bowl and installed a clear napa inline fuel filter.With in a few miles of driving the inline filter and fuel bowl both had a large amount of this in them.I thought maybe That someone coated the tank and the coating was coming off but I went under the car to drain the tank and the tank has never been removed from the due to looking at the tank straps still having undercoat on the threads.Did Packard tanks have a coating on from the factory? Or could someone have put something in the tank? It is not rust. Im probably going to remove the tank and get it cleaned. What ever the substance is it goes right through the napa filter.

Gasoline tanks of that era were typically made from a product known as terne plate which is sheet steel coated with an alloy of tin and lead; terne plate was pretty much the standard metal used for industrial containers for flammable liquids. No organic coatings or lining was used in the original tank construction. Though I can't recall ever hearing of it before, possibly the white material is tin oxide resulting from the oxidation of the terne plate, in turn resulting from long term exposure to moisture.

I got the tank out this morning and I dose look like oxidation and there is a lot of it on the sending unit. The inside of the seems to be totally covered in side with a whitish gray substance.I also checked the sending unit while i have the tank out it works and gauge registers but I guess the the tank lost its ground. Because it did not register on the gauge when it was in the car. I going to get the tank cooked and coated because I dont see anyway that I can get that oxidation out any other way.

got the gas tank back from the radiator shop.The guy said he cooked the tank 3 times and the gray powdery substance was still coming off. He coated and sealed the tank. He said the gray powdery substance was the galvanized coating coming off the tank.