Fuel tank removal

The next big task was fuel tank removal.  I had no idea how much fuel was really in the tank and I'm sure not going to trust any of the gauges in this car yet.  Thanks to the Haynes manual I learned the proper way to drain the tank: remove the guard plate underneath the car and remove the fuel hoses from the bottom of the tank, draining into a suitable container.
I was unsure how much fuel was in there but I knew it was more than any suitable container I had.  My plan was to find a good spot to pull the fuel line loose and let 'er rip, and replace the line when the container filled up, drain the container and repeat until done. 
I hate working with gasoline, it makes me nervous.  I can just envision a spark somehow being created when I'm covered in it from trying to replace a draining fuel hose when my suitable container is full...
As a side note -  in the era this Haynes manual was written, they recommend using gasoline for cleaning rubber gasket bits off of bodywork in some places; good luck finding a shop manual for a modern car that recommends that!  Kids, don't play with gasoline, seriously.

Anyway the protective guard plate under the car is a roughly 9 inch long 3 foot wide piece of metal bolted to the body underneath, with rubber gaskets along the long sides to try and seal it a bit with the car.  It's really the only removable piece of metal on the bottom side of the car near the front end, relatively easy to find :-)
This piece protects some important elements from road objects: the rack-and pinion steering assembly and brake master cylinder being the most obvious ones.  I had to use an impact wrench to loosen the large rusty bolts on the back side.  The front side bolts had been replaced with some shiny new hex-head metric bolts.  These are some of the few bolts that have been replaced by some previous owner that have been metric - usually I can tell the replacement bolts by the fact they used non-metric sizes.

Let's see what's under here...
The brake master cylinder!  This is the first car I've had where the brake master cylinder was not under the hood somewhere.  The fluid reservoir is under the front hood but the lines run right down to the master cylinder here.  It's got two "circuits" for fluid, one for the front and one for the rear brakes.  An electronic switch/sensor is supposed to be connected to that middle post but of course on this car, it is not.  The black wire above the master cylinder in the pic is the taped-off connector that's supposed to go there.  Nice.

What's this?  A non-vintage piece - aftermarket fuel pump.

 Typical lovely wiring through the bulkhead there.  The bar in the middle of the next pic is the rack-and-pinion steering assembly.  The steering wheel eventually connects to this center area through some rods and u-joints and the pinion (a gear) winds along the toothed rack translating your rotational motion of the steering wheel into linear motion.  The linear motion works on some tie rods that connect to the front wheel hubs/suspension (next pics).

 The top of this next pic shows the rubber boot protecting the end of the steering rack and tie rod assembly.  You can see where the tie rod attaches directly to the front steering knuckle (this is passenger side).  Looks like I have a nice stack of 5L mini-kegs in the background too.

 Driver side suspension view:

 Shot towards the rear of the car.  Note the floor plate that Cletus welded in for the driver's seat area.

 This hole leads to the bottom of the fuel tank.  Rather than try to disconnect the hose from the fuel tank itself up through this hole, it was much more convenient and logical to disconnect the feed line from the aftermarket fuel pump.  Finally something easy!

 Here's is my "suitable container" for gasoline - an enduring legacy from our dearly departed cat.  This is a "small" litter bucket, the larger one barely fit under the car and didn't give me enough clearance to safely reach the hose connection.  Once I took it off, the gas flowed rather strongly, especially when I took off the gas cap on top of the tank.

 Ahhhh....
This honestly did make me have to go to the bathroom - fortunately there's one 3 feet away from where I was working.  Kids - always build a toilet into your shop plans.

 So...there was a LOT of gasoline in this car.  I filled this kitty litter container 2.5 times!   Each time it got full I put the hose back on the fuel pump connector, poured the gas into a real gas can, moved it over to the tractor and poured it into the tractor tank! 

After all the fuel was out of the tank it was pretty easy to remove.  It has an auxiliary tank for expansion and a charcoal canister for fumes/emissions.  The aux tank was removed first and the charcoal tank small enough to leave attached.  The whole tank is strapped down by a metal strap with felt pads on it, and a metal seam on the tank supported/isolated with thick rubber bushings from the car body.  Pretty cool.

With the tank removed the front trunk area became a lot more enlightening.  Not a lot left up there - windshield washer fluid container, blower system for defrosters and heater/fan, and brake fluid reservoir.  In the middle of the hole there you can see the steering column headed down towards the steering rack.

 More vertical pic of the space:

 The defroster valves are complicated looking.  Their operation and air flow is controlled by levers and cables.  No fancy electronic HVAC in the 70s baby!

 Driver's side defroster and brake fluid reservoir.  This front area is remarkably rust-free, and all of this stuff stays relatively clean and oil-free because the motor is on the other end of the car.

 Despite not having electricity available the headlights can be manually raised with a knob on the back of the headlight motors.  This is the only way to remove the headlight assemblies.  Peek-a-boo!

I got the headlights removed but didn't get any pics.  I also removed some interior bits.  More pics next week hopefully!