Centurion Fuel Filter

[Malcolm Towrie]

John, I've been experimenting with the Mity-vac. We don't have the engine in yet and I redid all the tubing from the tank to the selector valve (rebuilt) to the filter (rebuilt) to the block on the bulkhead used to supply the Ki-gass hand pump. So I expected leaks. Sure enough the Mity-vac didn't pull any fuel so I hooked up one of those tools Princess's Auto sells for sucking oil out of engine sumps. It's a really neat tool. Basically it's a massive hand vacuum pump. That generated enough vacuum I could hear the leaks and fix them. Then back to the Mity-vac. Now it worked but it really doesn't like gasoline so when it sucks some in, it "delubricates" the internal rubber piston seals and gets tight to operate.

But usually with a Mity-vac, you get a little canister which acts like a catch can - you pull a vacuum on it and the fluid gets sucked into the canister and not into the Mity-vac. I'll check the canister out tomorrow and see if it works.

That hose barb you have between the filter and the fuel pumps sounds perfect for pulling a vacuum to at least fill the filter and get fuel to the pumps. It only takes around 2" Hg of vacuum to pull the fuel from the tank.

It's getting close. Should have the engine in and aligned, and the old girl driving by the end of October. I checked out the gear ratios in the transmission as the track pins are rusted up and it will take some oomph to get the tank to move initially. I definitely don't want to stress the clutch. The low reverse gear ratio is 22:1 - I've never heard of such a low gear ratio in a vehicle! (Car reverse gear ratios are usually about 4:1.) That should get her moving. There's only about 10' between the tank and the back wall but with that gear ratio, the wall shouldn't be a problem.
Malcolm