Yes, it is possible, but it is also one of the BIGGEST PITA jobs ever. If you have a lift it would make it way easier, but I personally did it in front of my garage on two small jackstands. You will also 100% need a small 12mm socket and a small SWIVEL extension for it. I will attach two pictures so you can see why. Two of the strap bolts are hidden right next to the subframe and near the shield. You can't reach with a normal socket or wrench in there, so you need some sort of swivel attachment small enough to fit in there. You may or may not need 1 buddy to help push (with his feet) against the fuel tank from the rear of the car, while you PULL the tank while under the car. It comes out at a weird sloped angle and takes a lot of jiggling.

The steps are roughly like so:

Drop the entire middle/rear portion of your exhaust.
Disconnect the driveshaft from the differential and remove both carrier bearings. You can leave it hanging on the ground or supported by some blocks off to the side so it doesn't get in the way.
Disconnect all the fuel related hoses and clamps going into and from the tank.
Remove the two bolts on the front side of the fuel tank straps so they hang down with the shield.
Remove the fuel neck filler completely.
Remove the fuel filler hose.
Then push the tank out.

It's doable, but it's hard, Get ready to invent new swear words. Good luck!

I already pulled the sending units/pump hanger from both driver and passenger side while draining the tank. Is that all the hoses other than the fill hose?

That was quite a pain but definitely doable. Putting the tank and shield back in is another story. Spent a couple hours yesterday putting the tank back in. Had to drop it back out a couple times and pull the fill tube. There's like zero room to access the hoses connecting the tank to fill tubes with the subframe in place. Eventually moved the hoses to the tank and was just barely able to reconnect them to the fill tubes once the tank was installed.

I have no idea how to put the shield back in with the subframe in place. I think the front straps were disconnected when we wiggled the shield off and then the tank. Pretty hard to do that in reverse though. I think we're just gonna cut the shield to clear the diff so it can be installed with the tank already strapped in place.

Kinda wondering if dropping the subframe would've been faster overall >.<

Looking at my pictures, I see I had both the big and small fuel hose attached to the filler neck first. So the way I did it was I positioned the shield with straps halfway in place, then slid the tank in there to get it sandwiched. Then I inserted the fuel neck just enough so I could clamp both ends on the fuel tank, then let the fuel neck hang loosely. After that, I continued to wedge the fuel tank back in its place, with the shield and straps. It was definitely just as much of a pain getting it back on, as it was getting it off. But at the end of the day you just have to power through it. You don't need to cut the shield anywhere. It's bendy enough to manhandle it until it fits over the diff. All that really matters is aligning the two bolt holes on the rear of the straps, as well as each nut that holds the strap to the shield.

Kryndon said:

Looking at my pictures, I see I had both the big and small fuel hose attached to the filler neck first. So the way I did it was I positioned the shield with straps halfway in place, then slid the tank in there to get it sandwiched. Then I inserted the fuel neck just enough so I could clamp both ends on the fuel tank, then let the fuel neck hang loosely. After that, I continued to wedge the fuel tank back in its place, with the shield and straps. It was definitely just as much of a pain getting it back on, as it was getting it off. But at the end of the day you just gotta power through it. You don't need to cut the shield anywhere. It's bendy enough to manhandle it until it fits over the diff. All that really matters is aligning the two bolt holes on the rear of the straps, as well as each nut that holds the strap to the shield.

Click to expand...

Thanks man.

I already got the tank mounted by the straps and got all the hoses connected. I don't really wanna mess with dropping it again. We had to use a jack on the straps and tank to get the front mounting points onto the studs on the car. Not sure if my straps are just bowed out a bit, but it was hard to get them on even with the tank perfectly in place.

It looks like if I just cut the part of the "tunnel" on the shield that sits above the diff, the shield will slide directly over the tank while it's already strapped in place.

Forgot to update. Gave me a good excuse to add a milwaukee M12 rotary tool to my tool collection. Made quick work of the shield and bolted up easily afterwards

Awesome work. It's good that you found a way to mount the shield easier by cutting a small portion of it. Hopefully other people looking to do this will come across your thread and learn from it. I actually left my shield with primer only since my rattle cans were all empty by the time I was done so I need to drop it sometime again for proper painting. Will do the same trimming you did!