if you have a plane with a cowl on it and your hose running to your exhaust prevents you from taking it off when refueling, is this a problem i guess my real question is how can you tell when you are full of fuel if you cant remove the hose or see it coming from the hose?

You'll see the fuel running out of the muffler.

I don't like to fill the tank until it runs out of the muffler. I just don't like to have all that alcohol in the vicinity of hot gasses coming out of the engine like that. And, some fields require fuel overflow recovery systems, so that would not work at these sites.

I try to make accomodations with the way I cut the muffler hole in the cowl so that I can get to the pressure tube via a hemostat (see picture if you don't know what I am talking about). Then I just reach in with the hemostats, pull off the tube, run it down and away OR connect it to a fuel overflow recovery system, then once filled, hook it back up.

It's somewhat of a pain, but after you get a method going, it's not that bad.

CGr.

I carry it a bit further. We fly at a field the usualy has fog in the moring during the summer months. I use a line to the return on my jug and all air expeled from the tank in fueling goes into the jug. When I see the fuel start to flow down that line, I reverse the pump for a second and then attach the lines to the muffler and carb. The filler line now goes back into the jug return. I've had good luck with this process, no fuel spills and no efect on the fuel, although my fuel doesn't get very old. I'm burning the last gallon of a case I bought last fall and it has been a slow time for me flying. I also plug both the fuel lines before leaving the field each day to keep the tank from picking up moisture.

On my Super Aeromaster, I ran the exhaust line out the back of the cowl and I have a U shaped brass tubing that I disconnect to make my fueling connections. The inlet has a fuel valve on top of the cowl.

Don

I usually just watch for the bubbles in the pressure line and then reverse the switch on my fuel pump. The only aircraft problem I could think of would be if the fuel ran back into the cylinder and you ended up with a hydrolock situation. All my engines are side mounted with the muffler down so that's not an issue.

I fuel until it starts to come out of the muffler. each field has different rules.

Muffler works fine. If the field has "recovery" rules (whatever that means), then you would simply put a 20 oz coke bottle or something under the muffler and let the fuel run into that.

one of our fields has a no spill or recovery rule. Most have a small jar with a piece of brass tubing soldered in the top. The vent line is then hooked to the jar for the overflow. Then the fuel in the jar can be put back in the container. At the price of fuel it makes sense to capture as much of it as you can.