Well, I finally got to this part of the project. I ended up cutting a couple of access holes in the surface under the bench seat in order to remove the nuts for the retaining strap. I dropped the helm reservoir off its mount and tried pulling the tank, but no joy. The thing is so long that even with the shorter profile there’s no way to get it out through the engine room. _MAYBE_ if the engine was out, but maybe not. It seems like the floor and the vertical supports in the engine room will be in the way.
The carpet is already out of the boat and much of the interior trim has been removed by previous over-ambitious owners. This has exposed a series of screws securing the bench seat fiberglass shell to the floor and along the aft cabin wall. I assume it’s similar near the cabinet at the forward end. That just leaves where it joins the hull on the side. It looks like a single layer of glass was added just to sort of stick it in place. I think if I cut that layer of glass I can remove the entire bench seat shell and that will let me get the tank out. It’s a shame I didn’t come to this conclusion until after I had cut holes in the seat. I was going to install a hatch cover there for access but now I think I will just glass the plugs back in place, fair it, make it look as good as I can and hope to never deal with it again once the repaired tank goes back in place.
It still sounds like a lot of work, but I think it’s going to be less work overall than pulling the engine out and even so I’m still not convinced the tank could come out through the engine room with the seat in place anyway.
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