What have you done today with your Austin Seven

[Chris Garner]

    A good day to reorganise the unit, move the cars around and sort out a few spares !

[bob46320]

A34 - I suppose that is what overflows are for although I thought it was actually an air vent to let air in as the fuel was consumed.

[Steve kay]

Seems to have been petrol spill day. I always put the ignition back on and concentrate on reading the fuel guage, stopping the pump in good time to keep below the breather/spill pipe. In the process of 230 miles including some tour recce, this afternoon stopped for petrol at Much Wenlock. A delightful lady came to speak to me, but instead of just ignoring her or saying, hang on a minute till I've filled the tank, I allowed myself to be distracted from guage watching long enough to allow spillage to appear from beneath the Ruby. Far from being told off, the lass at the till thanked us very much for spreading sand over the spill, saying most drivers just ignore it and drive off. Moral, no matter how delightful the person who wants to tell you about grandfather's Seven, just concentrate on the task in hand.

[squeak]

My ruby always used to pour  petrol out that breather until a little air would break the siphon. Cure was  to bend the pipe sideways to the horizontal and add a length of copper pipe to it using a rubber sleeve. I took the copper pipe up behind the back seat and back down again to the level of the tank bottom.  No more spills, happy day.

[David.H]

Same trick used on Rally cars, certainly in the 60/70s......not bending the filler pipe though!

[squeak]

David I thought I was clear, I bent the Breather pipe and added to it.  The soft solder on top of the tank held firm and allowed the bending.

[Hugh Barnes]

When wanting to brim the tank on the Cabriolet (such as on lengthy journeys) I always use the sign of fuel coming from the overflow as to indicate the tank is full. The trigger on the fuel pump never fires. The trick is to stop asap so as to limit the amout of overflow..

Am I doing a bad thing?

[Ivor Hawkins]

On the box saloon, I just look down the filler pipe and as soon as I see the petrol approaching the fuel nozzle, that’s it...enough to get me to Cornwall.

[Hugh Barnes]

Ah, but you can't do that with the Ruby version...

[JonE]

On same subject, I've been trying to work out what this addition to an early fuel tank does? Is it for fuel pressurising, or some form of measuring system? The filler cap is simple 1929ish bayonet with an air hole in the top. The outlet is in the conventional place at the bottom front edge of the tank.