I involuntarily dropped my fuel tank while driving down the road over the weekend. I got a replacement tank, straps, and j bolts. Can anyone tell me what the proper width rubber strap backing is?

I checked the parts stores and nobody carries it, is there a substitute I can use such as weatherstripping?

 

I used seatbelts with a steel tank, but you need something smoother with plastic. How about bicycle tubes split lengthwise? Put them on the strap so they wrap around it, then they will stay in place better when you tighten them up. Trim with a boxcutter with sheetmetal under it.

Did you try a search engine? I used Duckduckgo and had a whole page of pop-ups.

 

What's with the free labor? lol

 

They have to secure it or remove it before it can be towed. Hazmat rules.

 

Like said, cut strips out of an inner tube used in bicycle tires. Tape them to the tank or the straps so the rubber stays put while you lift the tank.

 

I just picked up some bicycle inner tube, looks like it’ll do the trick. Thanks guys.

Yeah I called the police dept. because I had just filled up and the entire tank dumped into a neighborhood street and a couple of the neighbors came out to see what happened. They actually didn’t secure the tank before towing and kindly didn’t cut any lines so that I wouldn’t have a bigger problem to deal with. To top it off the fire dept. kept apologizing for not being able to save any of my gasoline haha

 

The tape trick should work ok. If you want to glue it down, use 3M™ Hi-Strength 90 Spray Adhesive.
https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-...3242219&rt=rud

Best price I've seen in person is Walmart. NAPA charges quite a bit more.
https://www.walmart.com/ip/3M-Hi-Str...1-Can/20370808

 

Got the new tank put in and fired the Jeep up, seems to be all good! Just to put it out there, the straps I ordered from RockAuto came with new J-bolts, $26 shipped for everything.

One more question, how tight should the nuts be for the straps? I tightened both of the nuts on the J-bolts until the tank couldn’t be moved by hand at all, but the nuts can still be easily tightened more. If I keep going it seems as though the J-bolts will start to bend

Please ignore my rusty a$$ hitch receiver

 

I don't know what year you have but this is for an 97. This is inch lbs so it doesn't have to be crazy tight.

 

Did you give any thought to replacing the fuel pump or spraying the underside of you jeep with undercoating before putting the tank back on?

 

Ok thanks. I thought about replacing the fuel pump but once I saw that they were $180 I changed my mind haha. I have a rust hole in my frame that I’m planning to weld up this summer which will require dropping the fuel tank again, so I will be undercoating at that time. I’ll probably remove the hitch and install a skid plate for the fuel tank as well