Well, I've drained so many inlimbo cars' fuel tanks that I expect to see terrible brownish grunge every time I do it...and usually do....but now as I get really close to running my brand new engine in my 70 toro, I knew I'd better drain and clean the tank as the car was last registered in 1978 and has been apart and stored in a perfect place ever since.... yep 32 years or so...So I get to cyphening out what was in the tank and low and behold it's a very clear red colored barely stinky(as in stale) stuff that resembles what premium fuel used to look like....and I got to thinking spose the old boy who started this project was smart enough to put stable or some other form of gasoline preservative in the tank...hmmm I wondered what color the stuff would be....maybe he did it every year....what do you guys think? what have you lived thru?....thanks now ...cliff

 

I managed to get started once a '69 Cutlass owned by a friend that had been sitting in a garage for 10 years. The gasoline in the tank still worked.

If your car has been sitting for 32 years, I wouldn't trust even gasoline stabilizer to last that long. Maybe you're just interested in the weird color for sake of knowing what it was, but I would still drain the tank. If you're wondering if he might have put stabilizer in every year, I would guess not, but even if he had, what's in the tank might be mostly stabilizer by now! Again, I would drain it and start with fresh gas.

 

oh yeah, already done!