California fuel tank

Does anyone have a good close up pic of the California only fuel tank? What I want to see is the vent hose fitting on the left side of the tank that goes to the charcoal canister. Can someone with a Cali bike pull your left shroud and take a pic for me? I have an idea for a mod and need to know what this fitting looks like.

mwakey, see what you see on here and let me know if it is what you are looking for?

2
3

Ya, that's the hose I am talking about. It looks like that fitting on the tank is further back and underneath on the parts diagram. On your bike it looks like I thought it did. Right up front and easy to get to. What I had in mind was to get a small bladder tank and store it in a small tankbag with a hose going to this vent fitting you showed me. Add a cut off valve inline and you have an auxillary fuel tank setup that will fill the main tank on the fly. This would only work on 49 state bikes. Since they have vented gas caps this vent hose fitting could be used to ADD fuel to the tank from another tank and you could keep on riding.

It WAS a good idea until I found out how much a Califronia tank costs compared to the 49 State tank. I'm not paying that much for a fuel tank. I was trying to come up with a way to gain extra mileage without resorting to the Safari tank that is coming out soon. I just don't like the looks of it from the few pics I have seen. My idea seemed like a cheap way to go until I found out Yamaha wants to rip me a new A-hole with their pricing on that sucker! The Cali tank lists for over $1,200 and the 49 State tank is just over $340. I don't get it. The Cali tank is even a smaller capacity tank! I can only reason that these prices are for the tanks as an assembly, which means the Cali tank would come with the whole shooting match, Fuel pump, charcoal canister, mounting brackets and hoses galore. The 49 state tank would come with the tank and the pump basically, so I can see the price difference, but I just want the tank without the rest of what goes with it. I guess Yamaha doesn't sell it that way. Either I am wrong or there is just a big difference in price for some odd reason. You would think they would be about the same price.

Back to the drawing board...

Thanks for the pics BTW.

hey, you are more then welcome. good idea! i can't believe it's that much

Could you just mod a 49 state tank? Tap it with a fitting and, like you mentioned, a cut off valve. That way you could put the fitting exactly where you want it. I assume whatever bladder or auxillary tank you'd add would have to be higher than the fitting (gravity fed), right? Were you thinking of putting the aux. tank/bladder in a tank bag or tank saddlebags? I'm interested in hearing the design. Might be an option for those that don't want a safari tank. This setup could very likely be removed when not in use, if setup right, so would have that ability as well.

Chadx wrote:

Could you just mod a 49 state tank? Tap it with a fitting and, like you mentioned, a cut off valve. That way you could put the fitting exactly where you want it. I assume whatever bladder or auxillary tank you'd add would have to be higher than the fitting (gravity fed), right? Were you thinking of putting the aux. tank/bladder in a tank bag or tank saddlebags? I'm interested in hearing the design. Might be an option for those that don't want a safari tank. This setup could very likely be removed when not in use, if setup right, so would have that ability as well.

That would be an alternative. I haven't looked at my tank real close to see about that, but that might be a good idea. And lots cheaper too! Yes, my idea would be a bladder inside a tankbag and gravity feed. You would have to use a cut off valve since the main tank would overflow out the gas cap if you left it on all the time. I haven't thought too much about what type of a quick disconnect (and where to mount it), but yes, that would be part of the plan so you could take the spare tank off when you wanted to. Of course you could just take off the gas cap and have a small hose with a valve on it from the bladder and fill the main tank through the normal fill hole. But you would have to stop to do that. I just thought it would be easier and less chance of spilling fuel to have it "hard wired" so to speak to the main tank. You wouldn't even have to stop. You could reach down and open the valve when the fuel light comes on and fill up on the fly.

I would really like to take this bike on a long trip one time without having to worry how far away the next gas station is.

drater wrote:

mwakey, see what you see on here and let me know if it is what you are looking for?

2
3

Thanks again for the pics. Can you do me another favor and look inside the tank through the fill cap. I want to know if that CA vent fitting on the left side extends up to the top of the tank on the inside. Maybe if your tank is low on fuel you could see in there with a flashlight and tell how high that fitting extends into the tank. I am guessing it extends up high or else it wouldn't be venting the air and solid fuel would exit the hose into the charcoal cannister.

wakey, hows it? i looked in the tank and i can see that the line comes up from the left, the filler baffle has a piece under it that the line goes to. i can not tell what it does from there. what a piece of work in there.

drater wrote:

wakey, hows it? i looked in the tank and i can see that the line comes up from the left, the filler baffle has a piece under it that the line goes to. i can not tell what it does from there. what a piece of work in there.

Thanks for that info. I had a feeling it went up to the top of the tank. Yamaha must be proud of their engineering on that Cali tank to charge so much more for it. I can understand the extra work involved in making one like that, but the price difference is crazy high. I'm rethinking the whole thing now, but still want to do something like I mentioned originally.