OK, new beetle owner (what did we get ourselves into! :-) here so bear with me. :-)

1970 convertible but I have some questions:

1) After buying the owner mentioned that it was low on fuel when he dug it out from sitting in his barn so he put LAWNMOWER gas in it. That concerned me but I just figured he knew what he was talking about. But man, after reading the owners manual and talking about 91 octane and waking up from being brain dead and knowing that this is not exactly a lawnmower engine .... did he cause any damage by doing this? It ran fine during test drives but on the way home (a couple hundred miles) another issue came up (next question), but it still seems to be running OK. I put 7-8 gallons in it right after we bought it and haven't driven it more than 250 miles. Just topped it off with another 4 gallons tonight. Is his lawnmower gas gunking up the innards?

2) Halfway home I started getting gas fumes up front. our garage has a hefty gas fume smell now. Air it out but it comes back. A friend of a friend who knows something about bugs looked underneath and said something about when they did the jtubes (or was it disconnecting the heater box) they didn't cap off something, so that was probably why. But If that were the case why would it smell when it hasn't been run and the garage has been aired out? Unless there is a leak....how dangerous are those?

3) Reason I topped off the tank tonight is it said it was empty!!!! It had been about 1/2 last I drove it, and only putting in 4 gallons held true to that. But gauge reads empty still. :-( Do they stick?

4) I wasn't planning on putting in our 89 or 91 octanes, both of which contain ethanol, but instead use 87 octane. But the nearly 39 year old manual says to use 91 octane! Wow! So what to do, use 87 octane w/o ethanol or 89 or 91 with ethanol?

Please forgive a newbie and non-car type person. This was a way for us to get a third car for fun (convertible that is also a classic) even though we are in over our heads! We are going to have to have the chrome quad tailpipe replaced with something quieter too, that is for sure! And do something about the rust, the bad carpet, the dirty inside the....

But boy, does it make you smile every time you see her!

Bob

 

open the trunk and look at the top of your tank ther might be some small vent tubes on it they should have hoses oon them but theygo badall the time
if they are bad or missing just loop them from one to the other
and check your filler hose the claps might be loose
look under the front of the car fallow the tie rods to the center of the car this is where your fuel ilne comes out of the tank and in to the body that line might be bad
then there is a hose back above the drivers axle that goes bad too look at it and check you lines in the engine compartment yoou dont want those leaking
there is a post on here only 2 days old you can see what that will do


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