Gas caps

[Aspen500]

Does anyone know if all f's had painted gas caps or were some chrome, optional, model dependent?

I ask more out of curiosity than anything. Been wondering since OY has a pic of a painted on in his thread.

I am thinking of painting mine to match the car, maybe, possibly. The chrome one always kind of looked out of place to me plus, it's all scratched up. Having a chrome circle in the middle of the 1/4 is kind of odd (JMO) Always assumed it was the original cap, and maybe it is. It has no p/n that I can find.

 

[old yellow 78]

I'm pretty sure that all F's (except Super Coupes) came with painted gas caps. On the Aspens with the chrome side trim, there was a piece of matching chrome across the middle of the painted cap. But that can be removed if needed with two simple screws. The chrome caps like in your pictures, I am pretty sure are aftermarket caps. Obviously, woody wagons had woody type caps. There may have been an optional locking gas cap available too.

 

[Oldiron440]

I agree they started with painted but every replacement was crome.

 

[old yellow 78]

Here is a pic of the gas cap with the chrome trim on an SE Aspen:

Here is the standard cap without the chrome SE trim:

And of course the woody wagons:

I thought maybe the Super Coupes had a different type of cap, but maybe not as suggested by this pic:

 

[volare 77]

Your cap looks like a aftermarket replacement. It looks a little small and I never seen the factory cap with the red plastic vent. Yes, they were originally painted with the exceptions as mentioned. Most mopar replacement caps were chrome because most people that lost them didn`t want to paint the new cap. IIRC, they also came in primer. I may have a extra good used painted one. The mopar chrome one that I had a chrome handle but when I did a search it appears they went to a black handle sometime during the process. On the mopar black handle cap and the mopar chrome handle cap , the handle went from end to end like this: NOS Mopar 4002305 Fuel Cap | eBay

 

[volare 77]

Now I found one like yours and it was a mopar cap but must be a later manufactured cap to fit mulitple applications. NOS! OEM Mopar Gas Cap 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 81 Chrysler Plymouth Dodge 3E400 | eBay

 

[volare 77]

One note, if you get a painted cap to paint the color of your car I would get two of them in case one gets lost or damaged from dropping.

 

[old yellow 78]

I believe your are right volare77. The original caps for the F's all had the horizontal handle that went across the entire cap. The ones that don't I think were later, but still fit. OY has the chrome replacement cap that I will replace with a painted one. I also have a left-over locking chrome aftermarket one like this one, from one of my old F wagons, but it's ugly and I wouldn't use it on OY.

I saw this listed on EB as a cap for a Super Coupe, so I thought they were different, but maybe not according to the pic above. I have only ever seen a few SC's, so I don't remember. This one below is listed on EB for $300! uh, nah.

 

[old yellow 78]

This is the one I bought off EB to use for OY. It's off an Aspen with the chrome side trim, but I will take it apart to get the chrome piece off, and then without that, it should paint up just like the original. They are fairly hard to find and this was the only one I could find at the time. Notice the handle extends fully from side to side.

Here is an NOS chrome piece that fits under the gas cap handle for the Aspens with chrome side trim.

 

[old yellow 78]

Then, there were also these replacement all plastic caps. The seller of this one says that it is Mopar replacement, but I don't know for sure. I know that the handle looks slightly different than the all metal originals that came with the F's. Mopar NOS Dodge Aspen Plymouth Volare Road Runner R/T Super Coupr Gas Cap 1976 7 | eBay

Here's a plastic woody wagon one - seller says it's Mopar. Maybe they switched to plastic on later woody wagons like the Diplomats and T&C's?

 

[Oldiron440]

I've never seen the plastic one before.

 

[80mirada]

Super Coupes were supposed to have the finger notched black cap, though I wouldn't be surprised if some came through with the standard cap

 

[Aspen500]

That settles it. I am going to put a painted cap on. Not that I'm worried about originality (obviously). The handle on my chrome one is all but impossible to hold onto. It's shaped stupid, like a trapezoid (?), so it wants to "squirt" out of your fingers. I always CAREFULLY remove it using both hands but it's still ht the ground more than once.

Thanks for all the info guys! This proves the old saying that a car is never done.

 

[BudW]

I’m not sure when the cut off occurred (’78, maybe, but not sure). The older F’s, the gas caps had a metal outer cover that was painted body color. The handle was plastic and can be left black or painted body color as well.
The newer F’s, the gas cap still used the (same) metal inner part but the outer cover is now plastic (and painted body color). The handle and cover is molded into one part. The metal inner part (that screws onto filler neck) is the same part.

Now, all replacements come in chrome (one color fits all) – but I have seen a couple of woodgrain colored plastic caps in Mopar boxes, lately. The early woody wagons had metal covers with the same woodgrain plastic wrap on them as the rest of the car had.

I recently lost my original blue metal gas cap and I miss it. Currently it has a chrome replacement on it for time being. I bought a couple more chrome gas caps which I’ll remove the chrome plating then get caps painted to match the blue paint – so that way I can have a spare if I lose another cap. The caps have been acquired and taken apart. Now, I just need to get the work down (de-chromed & painted).



On another subject, three years ago this ad popped up https://www.forfmjbodiesonly.com/classicmopar/threads/flip-top-gas-cap-adapter.4777/ .
I purchased one (adapter) thinking this would be great as a replacement for our clunky gas caps. i already had a pair of ’67 GTX flip-top gas caps as well as a locking gas cap I purchased for my ’68 Charger (it fits under the flip-top). After pulling out my old caps (a couple of years ago) I found one cap has a major crack in it and the other one, the rubber seal is cracked bad. If I could swap the seal over to the other cap – I’d be doing great.

However, when Drilling out my plastic adapter on my drill press – the adaptor jumped from my hands and hasn’t been seen from, again (and I spent two solid weeks looking for it).

After looking at the plastic ring and looking at how the ’67 GTX flip-tip gas caps were made – I think I found a solution that I will try out shortly.

The large silver textured trim fits the contour of my station wagon nicely. The gold adapter ring

Is the only part I don’t have, and I believe I can make the metal one fit (without using the above mentioned plastic adapter) by making new screw holes into filler neck. I’ve been waiting to purchase this package – but keep finding more important things to blow my money on.

This is a picture of the locking gas cap from my ’68 Charger. If fits inside the fuel filler neck but will not go any further than flush with outside of neck. It works great – but finding another locking cap like this one, is not easy to do.

I bought this cap from Dodge brand new back in the ‘80’s (but this picture was swiped from eBay).
BudW

 

[Aspen500]

I'd like to find an original painted cap since they seem to be a little bigger in diameter than the chrome one I've got, and fit the opening better.

About your plastic adapter. You do know there are time/space portals and sometimes parts get sucked into a parallel dimension don't you? It has to be true. Just this week at work, I dropped a lug nut and it fell straight down. I looked right away and it was nowhere to be found. Looked under things, inside things, everywhere it could have possibly went and it was just gone without a trace. Should have had a drain pan of oil nearby, it would have been sucked right into it, lol. It didn't go flying out of an impact socket or anything like that, I simply dropped it. So,,,,,,,,,,parallel dimension is the most logical explanation.

 

[old yellow 78]

I’m not sure when the cut off occurred (’78, maybe, but not sure). The older F’s, the gas caps had a metal outer cover that was painted body color. The handle was plastic and can be left black or painted body color as well.
The newer F’s, the gas cap still used the (same) metal inner part but the outer cover is now plastic (and painted body color). The handle and cover is molded into one part. The metal inner part (that screws onto filler neck) is the same part.

I've had a bunch of F's, all but one were wagons. I only had one '79, and no '80's. None of them had plastic gas caps - even the several '78's, and the one '79 (which did have vinyl "wood"siding). The outer covers were indeed metal but the handle, which is detachable by simply removing two screws, seems to be to be cast, not plastic. Now, given the super tight quality control and rigid adherence to factory specs that the F's are world famous for , it still may be possible that some did indeed have plastic vs metal caps at various times and in various factories I suppose. Not a big deal anyway you look at it though. I prefer the metal painted caps, because that's what I'm used to. But, plastic would obviously not dent (which the metal ones were very prone to when dropped on their edges), and IMO are just find also. Well, fortunately, the Concours Mopar Snobs have yet to cast their gaze in our direction yet, so we can simply use whatever floats our boat or what we can find!

 

[Aspen500]

Let's hope the Mopar snobs never cast their gaze in our direction,,,,,,,,,,,and ruin it for everyone else. Sure, that means very, very few reproduction parts but it also means we (the regular guys and gals) can afford the cars and can build them any darn way we please. Restored, rodded, custom or any combination of those. I always call my car a "customrestomod". Part custom, part restoration, part modified.
Saying that, why am I worried about what gas cap it's supposed to have? Well, the correct size painted one would look better.

About 20 years ago, I had bought a '78 Aspen parts car and it had a cap that looked horrible. It was just a regular gas cap, like you'd have behind a fuel door or license plate. Now THAT look bad! If it had the original painted cap, I would hope I'd have kept it, but it didn't.

Another one of those hindsight is 20/20 things. Wonder how many painted caps I could have got at the salvage yard back in the 1980's? I vividly remember F-body's by the gross at one particular yard in the mid to late '80's, most rotted to the door handles (including R/T's, RR's and at least one SC) but so many good parts that got destroyed. Where's that dang time machine?

 

[volare 77]

I've had a bunch of F's, all but one were wagons. I only had one '79, and no '80's. None of them had plastic gas caps - even the several '78's, and the one '79 (which did have vinyl "wood"siding). The outer covers were indeed metal but the handle, which is detachable by simply removing two screws, seems to be to be cast, not plastic.

I agree , the original caps i have seen were metal with the metal handle. It must have been the replacement caps that were different. Seems like a couple different versions for sure.

 

[BudW]

The top two pictures on Post # 10, I've owned a couple of those plastic caps. At one time, I had about twenty ‘70’s Mopar gas caps including the two plastic F caps – but when I moved to current address (20 years ago) that box came up missing. I've never lost a cap myself, until recently - but have had friends who had. Having a cap on hand to hand them is something I've done over the years. The Gas cap on my '67 Satellite (not the '67 GTX pop-out cap, which is different) uses a special cap and is actually larger diameter than the F cap is.

Come to think about it, a lot of things came up missing during my move, including a couple of really low mileage 440 HP AVS carburetors (worth big bucks now), my 440 Six pack setup, new set of half moon hubcaps (exactly like what’s on my wagon) still in the Mopar boxes, and other items.
BudW

 

[Aspen500]

I have determined the cap I have is a Mopar replacement. There's one on ebay exactly the same, red vent and the same un-holdable-onto handle.
So far, all I've found is the chrome (either Mopar or aftermarket, like Stant) or original NOS or used woodgrain (plastic?) ones. Then again, I haven't been looking to hard either.