The smell of fuel

[Doehring]

What forum includes tank and fuel lines?

When leaving a gas station the smell of fuel inside my car is horrible while driving for the next 100 mls. sometimes less(or even zero), sometimes a little more. I couldn't find out what circumstances make it worse or less. I don't think it's sucking from the exhaust. After my last drive the first time now the smell of fuel even filled my garage but no leak is visible.

What to do, what to look for?

[sblake01]

I don't know what forum but it sounds like you have a problem with the rubber hose that connects the fuel tank with the fuel filler.

[Poindexter]

I have heard that this is a very common complaint that some have even misdiagnosed as exhaust fume infiltration. My PO even turned the exhaust 90 degrees to come out behind the left rear wheel in a mistaken effort to get the exhaust out into the slipstream more!

The first thing to do, for safety's sake, IMHO, is to take a battery powered carbon monoxide detector into the car with the windows closed and then open, and see if the alert gets triggered. Or a line-powered version with an extension cord. Or wait to see if your lips turn bright red then blue from the CO. Once you determine that there is no danger from carbon monoxide you might want to consider my fix below as one way to deal with this. Or it could be a bad gas filler tube too, but I don't know enough to comment specifically on it, having never disassembled one yet.

There are dozens upon dozens of vent lines coming and going between the tank and filler neck and the vapor tank, just about everywhere! Seriously, I have been told there are 7 in total. The same engineer must have designed the combo switch! The stock diagram has been posted here before and I've attached somebody else's well-though out mod/fix- with all due credit to them. I came up with a novel approach to make a temporary fix, as I understand the only "permanent" fix is replacing all of the lines among other things, like checking the sender plate, gas tank, etc., etc.- beyond the scope of this fix. I pulled the right rear inner panel off and the PO had wrapped dozens of grocery bags around the vent lines! I pulled all of them off, and painted that liquid electrical tape goop all over the hoses. This stopped virtually all of the gas smell. I've read that it's a good idea to replace the tail light gaskets and hatch weatherstripping too, but there are many threads I'm sure about sealing the back of the Z.

Good luck.

Edited August 20, 2008 by Poindexter

[Doehring]

Thankyou Poindexter,

I will look for the vapour tank region first. I will also try to find pout where to get that paint here.

Rolf

[Curtis240Z]

Depending on the year of your Z there are usually about 4 vent lines coming out of the tank to the vapor expansion tank. Also there are some expansion tanks that are plastic which could be cracked too.

The vapor being pushed out of the gas tank when it is getting displaced with gas during fill up is what you are experiencing. The vapor should be going to the expansion tank and routed into the intake of the engine.

[Doehring]

Thank you all, I will look for the problem the next days. At first I will check all the hoses around the vapour tank, I can't imagine its a rear gasket 'cause the worst smell appeared in the garage when the car stood still for a nightand the smell was extensive in the rear compartment. Poindexter's graph showed a possibility to get rid of the vapour tank. Any experiances with that?

Rolf