Cleaning the Fuel Tank - a method

[smacksman]

There have been many helpful posts on cleaning your fuel tank, from removal and steam cleaning to hoovering it clean with a shop-Vac.
Both require removal of the fuel and for me I didn't have anywhere in the Marina to put 15 gallons and I wasn't about to buy cans having just sold the boat.
Sadly my 1983 ally 72 gal fuel tank does not have a drain plug or a dipping port.

After some thought I devised the 'Bottom Feeding Method' using equipment I had on board.

1. Try and cant the hull a bit by stacking all the beer to port. Hopefully the sludge will gravitate that side.

2. Take a length of 3/4" pvc water pipe off-cut from making the frame for the Walmart shower curtains cockpit enclosure (see previous post) Drill a hole in the end and secure the suction hose with a cable tie so that the end of the hose is at the end of the pipe. The rigid pipe forces the flexi hose to stay at the bottom.

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4. Remove wires to the sender unit and tie back so that they don't get lost, then remove level sender unit.

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5. Drop suction hose till it bottoms and suck bottom fuel and sludge out with the engine oil suction pump (used in oil change) Suck from various positions at the bottom of the tank. It became clear that the port side was dirty whereas the starboard side pumped clear diesel.

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6. When gallon ex-water jug was full, stop and place to one side to let the crud settle. Sacrifice one of the beers used to careen the hull to help you wait.

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7. Pour off the clear(ish) diesel at the top of the jug back through a funnel into the tank.

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Repeat 5 to 7 until you a) get bored; b) clear diesel is pumped; or c) you run out of beer.

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Empty into the Marina waste oil drum.

Not a perfect solution as the tank has baffles so you cant suck from the whole bottom but doing it a couple of times will relieve pressure on the secondary filter to feed clean fuel in rough weather.

[kerrye]

Good idea. For a person who wants to drain the fuel, a 5 gallon bucket with a liquid tight lid is about $5 at Home Depot compared to $20 for a 5 gallon diesel jug.

[smacksman]

Quite right, kerrye. But for me it is a $60 taxi ride to Home Depot (no public transport this far out of the center of town) and at $2 a gallon it is cheaper to dump it if only I could find somewhere. The marina waste oil drum would be filled and not make them happy!

Oh and if you buy cans or buckets make sure they are yellow. California law says that the manufacturers use a special yellow plastic that reduces diesel vapour escaping through the can and killing whales. Red gas cans from Walmart WILL NOT DO. The fact that the spout is installed in the can so that when you open it to pour the contents, several ounces spill all over the place and far more that will evaporate through the sides of the can in a thousand years is beside the point. When all this legislation was made law was there a sailor on the committee I wonder?
If you can't smell the difference between gas (red), diesel (yellow) and kerosine (blue) and water, then find a person who can.

[Sprig1]

Roger congratulations on selling the boat. You will be missed around here. Looks like the same mess I got out of my tank nice idea for cleaning. Kerrye I used your idea the other day of the shop vac and the five gallon bucket it worked great I had water in my lawn mower tank it worked great thanks. Cleaned it out to the last drop.

[Beta Don]

I think cleaning it out as best as you can like Roger suggested is a good idea. After that, install a Racor 500 fuel filter and buy a few $10 replacement elements for it - Replace them as they plug up . . . . you'll get plenty of warning when the engine begins to starve for fuel. When mine plugged up at about 225 hours, the engine made a slight missing noise at 2500 RPM's, so I decreased to 2250 which worked fine for the next 4 or 5 hours. When it missed again, I reduced to 2000 for a couple hours until I reached my destination, where I cleaned and replaced the filter - It held a LOT of the black goo before it affected the performance of the engine

Don

[kerrye]

How many micron filters are people using? From what I've seen these kind of diesel filters are available in 10, 20 or 30 microns.

[sail149]

Hi
From the data section of the site some interesting thoughts on fuel system set up
download/file.php?id=401
I think from this system you can use an electric fuel pump to bypass the engine to polish the fuel without a special seperate polishing system.

[Beta Don]

I think from this system you can use an electric fuel pump to bypass the engine to polish the fuel without a special seperate polishing system.

If you have a tank which needs cleaning, a separate Racor 500 with an electric pump feeding back into the tank should eventually do the job

Racor 500 elements come in 2, 10 and 30 micron sizes. There is no need for the 2 micron, as it's much finer than the primary element on the engine, so either a 10 or a 30 would suffice for tank cleaning. The one I was using at the time was a 30 micron and that cleaned the fuel well enough that the engine mounted filter did not need to be changed

You can buy a Racor accessory vacuum gauge for these filters. It replaces the T handle which holds the top on the filter. The gauge is calibrated so it tells you when the filter is beginning to clog so you can change it preemptively just before it clogs. If you buy the filter elements in packs of 3 they are about $30 - Even cheaper if you buy them in packs of 10

Don