Fuel Fill Hose HELP!!!!

[bobbert]

The Ethanol Germlin's hit me BIG Time this year. Turned into Naplam between Filter and Carb. So Pulled the console, lifted tank hatch, removed tank. The last owner put in new tank 6" to far to the stern. Removed 20+ gallons of fuel. 6.5 gals of which was real funky. Removed and Cleaned tank.
Now comes the problem. Have to replace fill hose with new Ethanol approved type.

How do you get the hose back in??? This is a 1975 20' CC powered by 3.0 Merc I/O.
Do I cut a access hole in side deck, reroute to the console or????
Any suggestions appreciated..

The old timer

P's Yes the covering deck is water logged and weighs about 50#. Have opened it up, removed the combination of balsa and plywood. Plan to recore with Baltek. and 1708 Cloth.

[jonesg]

I did all my hoses whilst I had the deck off, its still a beech of a job pulling it thru. Recommend you have 2 people, push and pull.

My mechanic suggested I could try cutting the gunnel open to facilitate , bah I showed him.

[Tiny]

Be sure to use the old hose to pull the new hose if you can. It makes it a lot easier.

We were lucky enough to have a brass 1 1/2 splice that joined the two hoses nicely. They do have wire in them, you might be able to drill holes in each and zip tie or use wire to join them.

[BigLew]

Tiny makes a great point. Hopefully, you have not remove the old hose yet.

What you need to do is create a guide wire! Get the stiffest wire or other item you can find that will pass down through the old hose to the end. Then, take the new piece of hose, put it over the guide wire and push it into place while it pushes the old those out. The guide wire will need to be at least twice as long as the original fuel hose so that you can keep tension on the guide wire while pushing the old hose out.

When everything's in place, i.e. the fuel fill pipe is attached to the hose, then you can remove the guide wire. A suggestion for the guide wire might be 2-4 AWG wire(battery)cable or something else equally heavy and stiff.

Just my 2¢ worth. Good luck.

[Kahuna]

ODT,
I had the SAME problem on my 2008 3.0 seafari repower. Tank was new, motor new, fuel line new, filter new, only original thing left in the boat was the fuel fill, fill hose and vent hose. why those were never replaced when the original owner did the tank, I will never know. With the tank out, I pulled the old fuel fill and house out. I used a coat hanger to fish a piece of 130lb dacron from the fuel tank space to the gunnel. tied 3 rolling hitches around the hose with teh dacron and pulled. I thought it was going to be alot harder than it was. I had sufficient space under the gunnel to get both hose clamps on the fuel fill.

[Wags23]

I used a metal snake. Two man operation, feed the snake down and then bend tip of snake and cut it into hose use pliers bend snake tip .push and pull with a helper . The hose is very strong so it was no problem.

[bobbert]

Guys thanks for the input. Had removed hose before your ideas.
Was lucky enough to have pulled thru a pulling rope when I removed hose.
Let's just say this was a unexpected nasty job.
Could NOT pull from the tank coffin to gunwhale.
Would only work from the gunwhale down.

It was definitely a two man job.

Once again thanks for your input.

Now to throw in some gas and splash this great boat.

[BigLew]

Congrats, man! Only GOOD LUCK from here on and, PS, ENJOY the Ride!!!!

[bobbert]

Will really enjoy this ride. This was a project boat that my 16 yo grandson has been helping me with.
Intend to introduce him to the joys of fixing up old CLASSIC boats and the joys of Boating and fishing.

Thanks for your good wishes.

Bob "the old timer"

[BigLew]

"Introducing" him to classic boat restoration? You're spreading the disease!! The number one distinguishing symptom is not being able to differetiate between passion and insanity!! But don't sweat it, it builds character and strong will!!!! ...but what a way to go! Die broke but happy.