charcoal cannister delete

[dave73chally]

So I deleted my charcoal cannister about a year ago because it was rotted and leaking. I made the mistake of simply removing the cannister and plugging the line. The result was vapor lock and the "whooshhh" sound when pulling off the gas cap. As a band aid, I put on a vented gas cap and problem solved. To make things a bit more confusing, when I crawled under the car I noticed the previous owner bypassed the vapor seperator. The 4 lines coming off the tank are connected right back into the tank, so nothing is connected to the vapor seperator. So I'm guessing regardless of my charcoal cannister being hooked up or not, the tank wasn't venting into it?

Now, I still have the line running up front into my engine bay from the vapor seperator and I'd like to remove it completely. Am I safe keeping the gas tank lines routed off the vapor seperator as they are, capping the line to the cannister at the vapor seperator and running a vented gas cap. Is this the best way to remove the cannister or is there another preferred method?

[burdar]

Personally, I'd like to see you keep the charcoal canister.  You can get more charcoal to refill the canister.  You'd just have to figure out how to keep it all inside with the bottom screen removed.  If you really want to do away with the system, your vented cap is all you need.  You could plug off the four nipples that come out of the tank. 

With todays fuel, a lot of people are adding return lines to their tanks to fight vapor lock.  Instead of removing the vent line, you could leave it there and make it a return line.  They sell fuel filters with a return line built into the side.  You'd just have to figure out a way to get the gas back into the tank at the back.

Don't throw away your vapor separator.  They aren't reproduced and I see people looking for them from time to time.

If you are removing the charcoal canister because you think it looks ugly in the engine compartment, you could mount it in a different/hidden location.  Maybe up above the rear end or back in a corner of the trunk.  You would still have the benefit of not releasing fumes into the atmosphere AND the engine compartment would look cleaner.  The canister weighs next to nothing so you aren't really saving any weight by removing it.

[dave73chally]

So basically I have 2 options. Keep it as it is currently setup; gas tank lines not hooked to vapor seperator, cannister line capped and run a vented gas cap. Or, hook gas tank lines up to vapor seperator and keep the cannister line upfront but utilize as a return. With the latter option, do I need to ditch the vented gas cap?

[burdar]

You still need to vent the tank.  I'm not sure if it's a good idea to use the separator in a return system.  There is a valve inside that might not allow liquid fuel to flow through it.  They do sell new sending units with a return nipple in them.  You could probably have a return nipple installed into your existing sender if you take it out first.  You might be able to just run the return into one of the four vent line coming out of the tank.  I would not use the separator though.  Maybe it can be done...maybe not.

[dfrazz]

On my '71 Challenger I also had the second fuel line capped and just pulled it out and installed a new line to be a return.  I ran both the main and return to a Napa fuel filter with a 1 inlet and 2 outlet (one for the return).  The tank was only vented through the gas cap.