Easy fix for carburetor fuel line leak

[SteveR.]

Woke up this morning to a house that smelled like gas because I forgot to turn off the fuel valve on the "A". Decided to try to fix it right, it has been an ongoing issue for months, and didn't go away with a newly overhauled carb. The fuel line had essentially been shrunk over the years from repeated tightening of the nut on the ferrule. The ferrule fit very loosely on the fuel line. I took an old flared punch of my Granddad's, probably 60 years old, inserted the punch in the end of the fuel line and gave it several good taps from a small hammer. This flared the end of the fuel line slightly so that the ferrule has something to press on, and now the ferrule sticks at the end of the line. Tightened the nut/ferrule up and turned the gas on and the leak is fixed, not even a hint of a leak with the head pressure of a full tank. No sealants or tape or anything else on the fitting were needed. I suspect this is a much better fix than a lot of the band-aid fixes out there such as tape and sealant, most people don't realize the aluminum line has been shrunk over time.