Brown Davis tank installed

[euclid]

I just finished installing my Brown Davis extended range tank. Here's some info for others.

I got an LR601 175 Liter.

I'm very pleased with the product, and I highly recommend Brown Davis. Mention Ih8mud.com when you buy from them!

General impressions:
The Brown Davis staff is very helpful. They are working on improving their setup for international sales, but what they lack in setup they make up for in communication. Remember, they are about a day ahead of US time. Check the time difference if you are wondering when they will respond.

Shipping:
The shipping agent on the Australia side dropped the ball for mine. Both Brown Davis and I thought the quote was for door to door shipping. Not so. It was door to terminal (Memphis). These things happen, so oh well. I paid $530 AUS freight.

If you are within easy driving distance to a city with a customs office I recommend requesting door to terminal shipping, then go pick it up yourself. Will save you a buck.

97X90X40 CM dimensions
Weight aprox 40KG
Customs:
Option 1: Let the shipper on the Australia side arrange for a customs broker on the US entry. Expensive, awkward and lots of room for screw-up.
Option 2: Handle customs brokerage yourself. You have to get a customs bond, and fill out some pretty complicated paperwork. I deal with legal language daily in my work. A lot of the paperwork looked pretty stout to me.
Option 3: Have it shipped to a terminal in the nearest town with a customs office and hire a local customs broker to do the paperwork for you. Mine charged $135 on top of the $25 customs fee. Not bad. You will have to sign a Limited Power of Attorney for the customs broker.

Kit impressions:
The kit is perfectly complete. I missed this fact because I often get too excited about this kind of mod and hurry through the details. I ended up making my own pickup tube because I was careless in unpacking my kit. Advice I don't heed myself: take your time and lay the parts kit out as you unpack it.

Install notes:
The install instructions make more and more sense as you get into the job. The diagram for the vent lines is a little hard to read. Here's something that helped me understand the directions a lot when I realized it: Passenger and Driver side are opposite! When you read the directions, swap these terms. The directions make a lot more sense when you do.

You shouldn't need to get any extra fittings (assuming you don’t' throw some out because you were in too much of a hurry to unpack) but if you do need more fittings you will need to take note that they are all BSP (British Standard Pipe). Fittings you buy at your local hardware in the US will likely be NPT (National Pipe Thread). For a vent line you can get away with using NPT fittings in a BSP thread, but not for pickup or return lines.

The tank is very well made. I was able to install it myself using straps to hold it up as I maneuvered it into place.

My sway bar had to go away. The frame mounts would hit the tank.

My 2" body lift means the tank tucks up in there pretty nicely. The tank bolts to the 6 factory bolt holes that hold the OEM tank.

Fuel tank pump question - FJ62 specific. FJ60's have a mechanical pump so the tank will bolt right up to them.

Fuel Sending unit mod:
I used a piece of copper refrigerator tubing for the extension of my sending unit arm. After discussing it here I took the advice of Gary Coberly and used copper because it is easy to find and easy to work with.

My local Ace had refrigerator tubing that fit snugly over the rod of the sending unit arm. I cut the arm, cut the tubing to length (175 MM), coated the arm ends in solder then stuck the arm ends into the tubing 25 MM on each end, extending the arm by 150 MM. The Brown Davis instructions have a diagram. I drew it out on my work table to help out.

I crimped the tubing down onto the arms in several places, and then soldered it up. The pictures show the length, not the correct orientation of the float to the sending unit.

I tested it in a bucket of gas, floats great.

 

[euclid]

Pictures of silver soldering a copper pickup tube to a fitting. If you unpack carefully you will find the Brown Davis made pickup tube and you won't have to do this:

 

[euclid]

First fillup. I put a full Jerry Can in at the house. This was to the first click of the pump. I always stop there.

Of note to old 3FE'rs is the fact that I always use Chevron gas 'cus OMA, Grumpy OMC and Pirate Dave said so!

 

[Moby]

Thanks for the update! A Brown Davis aux tank is getting very close to the top of my short list of mods.

 

[Mace]

The shipping agent on the Australia side dropped the ball for mine. Both Brown Davis and I thought the quote was for door to door shipping. Not so. It was door to terminal (Memphis). These things happen, so oh well. I paid $530 AUS freight.

Be aware, this happens, a lot..
The state shipping "handlers" will hold on to your stuff till you pay up as well.
Nothing like spending an extra couple of hundred bucks that you did not expect..

 

[Jan-78FJ40]

I assume for the L60R1 175 liter your spare has to go from underneath, correct?
thanks,
J

 

[NLXTACY]

You mention the sway bars get 86'd, how much does this effect the driveability of the truck now and is there a work around?

 

[Jan-78FJ40]

You mention the sway bars get 86'd, how much does this effect the driveability of the truck now and is there a work around?

from my experience it does not matter. I have no rear swaybar on the 84 HJ60. granted it has OME heavy springs plus an additional leaf, but even loaded for a 4 week trip to Baja there is no significant swaying on the highway or other curves.

 

[kling-on]

NICE I want one

 

[euclid]

I assume for the L60R1 175 liter your spare has to go from underneath, correct?
thanks,
J

Yes. The bolt on cross member that holds the spare up has to go away to make room for the tank.

You mention the sway bars get 86'd, how much does this effect the driveability of the truck now and is there a work around?

I have been a big proponent of keeping my sway bar. I've gone to lenghts to keep it because I like the way the truck drives with it connected, especially with my full length roof rack. As far as a work around, I think it would be pretty simple to fab a bracket for the top connection of the swaybar that would fit between the Brown Davis tank and the frame. I won't have time to tackle that before my upcoming trip to Katemcy. Driving impressions so far: The weight of a full tank of fuel seems to mitigate any sway at low speeds. I can't feel much effect of the fuel at highway speeds. I'm interested to see what it drives like with half of a tank, not there yet.

Driving with no sway bar is certainly something I could get accustomed to, but my preference is to keep it if possible.

 

[Bomar]

NICE I want one

Me too. Greg keep up the awesome mods!

 

[kling-on]

..... I paid $530 AUS freight.....

was this just for the frt or total ?? and if it was just frt can I ask what the total was ??

 

[Jan-78FJ40]

Yes. The bolt on cross member that holds the spare up has to go away to make room for the tank.

Thank you, that's what I feared. Carrying 2 spares is more valuable for my trips than a big tank. With the diesel I still have a 450 mile range (although twice that would be GREAT).
cheers,
Jan

 

[Jason YY]

I like the 1.85 gas, and I two would like to know what the total was.

 

[euclid]

was this just for the frt or total ?? and if it was just frt can I ask what the total was ??

Freight only. I paid around $850 aus, but I get the feeling they may raise prices soon.

 

[kling-on]

Freight only. I paid around $850 aus, but I get the feeling they may raise prices soon.

so 850 for the tank and 530 frt total of 1380


ps when are you driven in for round up and when are you leavin ... I will only be there Sat hope to see ya again before its over

 

[Kynot62]

What was your solution for the external fuel pump? Or did you put that in the older thread?

For what it's worth I pulled my sway bars about 3 years ago and I couldn't tell the difference and I don't notice any excessive lean in corners or change in handling. I run pretty heavy with a roof rack and frequently with a military style trailer in tow.

Tony

 

[euclid]

so 850 for the tank and 530 frt total of 1380


ps when are you driven in for round up and when are you leavin ... I will only be there Sat hope to see ya again before its over

Yes. In Austrailian dollars. The US dollar is strong right now compared to austrailian, so it was a good time to buy.

I'll be there Wed about lunch time, leaving early Sunday. YGPM

What was your solution for the external fuel pump? Or did you put that in the older thread?

For what it's worth I pulled my sway bars about 3 years ago and I couldn't tell the difference and I don't notice any excessive lean in corners or change in handling. I run pretty heavy with a roof rack and frequently with a military style trailer in tow.

Tony

External fuel pump stuff linked above.

I can tell a difference with no sway, I've switched it around a lot to get it like I wanted. I went to some trouble to get it set up on my full floater install. I'll likely figgure out a way to keep it, but it remains to be seen. Tounge weight from a trailer probaly helps with sway..

 

[Gwynley]

Like your idea for the level unit extension, my 4wdsystems tank just came with an extra bit of rod which they advise the braze to the old one - but i think you solution looks better.

Have you got any pictures of the tank in? My tank seems to clear the "sway bars" (we call them anti roll bars here) mounts fine.

How much does it hang down? I am deffo thinking that a little bit of a body lift will be a good idea with a long range fuel tank.

Just for comparison, the 4wdsystems tank was 750 AUD - shipping to the UK was more than to the US - it is further!

 

[euclid]

After running about 4 tanks through here's an update.

My fuel level sending unit mod wasn't quite right. I droped the tank yesterday and bent it down some to make it drop lower. The way I had it set up before (pics above) had it droping to E too quickly. I bent it quite a bit. I had about 1" of fuel in the bottom of the tank when I had the sending unit out. I set it up so that the needle was touching the E on the guage.

I just drove 165 miles, and the needle is still on F. That's fine, because as you will read below accuracy is more important at the E than at the F.

A friend let me use his shop with a lift and a transmission jack to get to the sending unit. I didn't have to drain the last bit of gas, which was nice. I just unhooked the vent lines and filler tube, and the tank droped down with ease.

Here's corrispondance concerning the guage issues:
Please help me sort out why my fuel gauge isn't operating as it should.

I modified the sending unit by extending it the requisite 150 MM. I didn't find bronze wire easily, so I used copper refrigerator tubing.

My gauge shows full on fill up, but when the gauge reads empty my truck has only used about half of the fuel in the tank. I ran the truck a good way past empty, and the gauge continues to drop way past the E mark.

Please advise.

Greg Thompson

Hi Greg,

It seems as though the length/angle of the sender tube may be slightly out. When setting up the sender tube it is more important to have the float adjusted so that it shows empty correctly than full. By that I mean, that even if the float is only sitting at half way up the tank when you lift the float up to where it would sit at full position. The float head needs to sit around ¼”-1/2” off the tank bottom when the sender is sitting in natural empty position with no fuel. You test this by sitting the sender unit along side the tank when doing the length adjustment. Based on the info you’ve shared, it seems that the float is sitting well above the ¼-1/2” off the floor and as such it reaches empty before it is actually low.

Unfortunately, if this is the case it means the sender will need to come out and you will need to bend the tube between the float and the sender unit to point the float down closer to the tank bottom.

Let me know if this sounds about right from when you installed it, if not we’ll search deeper for you.

Regards,