Oil & Fuel Fuel cap gasket fell into tank. Now what?

[rdsaustintx]

Drain the tank next time you roll the tractor?

 

[ctgoldwing]

I'm in the wholesale plumbing & heating business. Ridge tools (Ridgid) has a "See Snake", a flexible, extendable camera tool with a few different 'snagging' tools for the tip (magnet, J Clip). If you can find a plumber who has one that you can borrow you are in fat city. The standard length is 3 feet but 3' extensions are available. The device has a pistol grip with small LCD screen facing up and the flexible extension extending from the barrel. They recently came out with a new model so old ones are going pretty cheap (~$200). Its a great tool for many applications (wires in walls, hardware that falls in the engine compartment etc). There may be other manufacturers with similar products.

 

[JOHNTHOMAS]

I had a gas Kubota a couple of years ago and one day I looked down in the fuel tank and the gasket your talking about was laying just in the tank on the ledge of the tank. I reached in and pulled it out. It was sort of dissolving so it wouldn't go back on the lid and stay. Asked Barlows to get me a gasket. Kubota didn't show one so they gave me a new cap with gasket. A few months later my mower would start running bad then die. It would restart later. Looked at the fuel filter which was opaque and could see some black stuff in the filter. Changed the filter and never had another problem. The gas had dissolved the rubber washer. Another idea along with those already offered is fill the tank and see if it will float to the top.

 

[ByronBob]

Don't drop something else in the tank trying to fish the first thing out. I did this before. It's like putting a dunce cap on.

 

[pdowling1]

I would skip the coathanger idea, you would most likely just find the fuel gauge sender float arm & ruin your sending unit. I wouldn't worry about it at all.

 

[FrontEndLoader]

Thanks for the tips everyone (and some laughs!) My tank is offset and the gasket slid right off the ledge immediately so I would be fishing around blindly for the thing. I did try filling the tank in hopes it would float, but no dice. I've only run it about ten minutes since it fell in, but seems ok so far. Perhaps I will let it be until something changes and then go fishing.

 

[jnjpream]

How's your luck?

If it were me "until something changes" would happen when it's 35 degrees and raining and I'm ten miles from home with my tow vehicle stuck in the mud along with my cell phone (from when I bent over to look at the truck and it fell out of my pocket) 20 minutes before the sun went down..

Hope you have better luck that me.

 

[CurlyDave]

In winter I always carry another layer of clothes, so that if I am forced to stay overnight in the vehicle I don't freeze...

Now, my extra layer is a pair of coveralls, not the bib-type ones, which are also handy in a lot of situations.

 

[BX Tex]

Drain tank completely, then use a vacuum of some kind.
Of course, if it were in gasoline, use of a ordinary vacuum cleaner would most likely give you bad results

 

[ragkar]

Those three prong grab hooks are very handy shop tools.
It seems that I'm always using mine to pick up a spring
or nut that rolled behind the shelving.
Harbor freight probably has it cheap.