I have a 35' Cigarette(pictured under the Cigarette Forum) that I had IMCO make a 180 gallon fuel tank for. They do awesome work. It will go under the cockpit floor in the center bilge area. It will be on pads and no water will get into the fuel cell compartment under normal conditions. I plan to coat the bottom, sides, and ends of the tank with an epoxy based truck bedliner from Rust-Oleum just as a additional precaution to prevent any corrosion. Has anyone done this or found any relevant information. It seems like a lot of the "boating experts" condemn aluminum fuel tanks as unsafe, but to me it has more to do with the installation. There are no large plastic tanks available from my research. Thanks. Bob.

I have never coated an aluminum fuel tank, but I made an aluminum outboard transom jack/setback bracket for a Whaler. It had a short transom, I had a long motor.. this boat sees a lot of salt water.

I did it about 6 years ago, and the aluminum is still encapsulated, with no bare metal showing, or corosion.

I used " Metal Prep" alodine etch to prep the metal, then coated it with Interlux " glass Flake" which is an epoxy barrier coat used to prevent blistering on fiberglass. Interlux makes a few different barrier coatings.. I did my Wellcraft bottom ten years ago, with 6 coats(don't wait more than 2 hrs or you have to sand the whole thing again..) of "Interprotect 2000" barrier coat..the stuff is practically bulletproof!

It is very important to etch and prep aluminum if you want he coating to stick..Alodine, then zinc chromate is recommended, but I think I just used the 2 part prep kit and then just used the epoxy. I an sure you could get good results on a tank using this kind of treatment.. I wouldn't use bed liner.. I would use a product designed for water immersion. Something from the Petit or Interlux catalog..possible a coal tar epoxy.

Good Luck,
Dave

Dave, thank you for the information. I am a big fan of Interlux products and have used the ones you mentioned. The bed liner is a true epoxy 2:1 ratio catalyzed system, and I have a feeling that it is very similar to coal tar epoxy. I will experiment when I receive it before I coat the tank. Bob.

Bob..

I recently installed a custom aluminium fuel tank on our magnum and we specifically requested extra heavy gauge .When finished we lightly scuffed up all surfaces and acetone washed.Then three coats of GLUVIT.This is an American made product .. 2 part epoxy sort of flesh coloured.Sticks like *hit to a blanket and always remains flexible but it does cure hard !Almost gaurantee forever
I have recently heard conflicting reports on Stainless steel being used for fuel tanks ..supposedly the USCG wont certify
Also make sure your new tank is well grounded/we prefer manually read fuel gauges !