Transporting 20 gallons of gas in your trunk and storing in your back yard in the open air question

[salty]

Nope. I have it exactly right.

[Steve Barker]

even compressed in a perfect mixture (ie gasoline engine) it STILL does not explode. It is, however, a rapid burning action.

[Steve Barker]

it did not explode. Not with just gasoline. You may have witnessed a rapid burning, but not an explosion.

[notbob]

Aren't all explosions?

nb

[Ralph Mowery]

While probably not strickly correct, there are high and low explosives. The high explosives material go off almost all at once such as the C4. The low explosives burn very fast, such as black powder.

[Roy]

=3D=3D An acreage or small farm will naturally require more maintenance and of course more gasoline or diesel. I have a 300 gallon gas tank but the average city lot isn't that large that such reserves are required. Close neighbors have to be in the equation. =3D=3D

[Roy]

=3D=3D More likely as Chief Execution Officer. =3D=3D

[chuckcar]

Bill Murphy wrote in news:i25fcg$vjv$ [e-mail]:

Do they have vent holes and/or pour spouts? If so, take the spouts out and loosen take off the vent cap. I had a gas can (1 gallon for the mower) that I didn't do that when I got gas at the beginning of the year. Once it warmed up, the vapour pressure forced the gas out the top even though it was tightly sealed. There was a gasoline smell for two days and it could easily have lit from open flame. If your neighbour had smelled that.. Well who wants the fire dept. and city on their tail?

BTW I live in Ontario on the other side of the border. Far farther north than you, so less heat and different laws. We have red plastic cans here.

[Steve B]

"Ralph Mowery" wrote

Strictly put, there are a lot of terms regarding "explosions".

You refer to explosive materials, such as C4. Explosives are rated at feet per second. C4, IIRC is somewhere around 26,400 fps, which means that if you put 26,400 feet of it out there, it takes one second to go from one end to the other. It is not sensitive to impact or friction. And technically, it does not explode, rather detonates is the proper term. Black powder is much much slower, as we have seen the black powder trail to the dynamite or keg of powder as in the movies. (Black powder may or may not detonate dynamite, depending on the stability of the dynamite.) It's just a fast walking speed. C4 detonates at hypersonic speed, producing a much greater shock wave than black powder, which essentially burns, but rapidly and causes pressure within a confined space which usually powers a projectile out an opening. Black powder can also be used for fracturing rock if it is packed. Loose black powder will just make a lot of smoke.

Then you get into vapor explosions, which are rapid combustion, and not actually an explosion, as another knowledgeable poster pointed out.

Then there are BLEVE's, or boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion, which is called an explosion, but it is just still another rapid combustion, but these usually occur within vessels that keep the pressure in until something lets go.

IIRC, there is a speed of burn where it technically becomes an "explosion" and not a conflagration (uncontrollable burning) or rapid combustion. And then there's "brisance" which is the rapidity at which it reaches it's maximum speed or shattering ability, usually measured in feet per second.

It gets real technical. For some good youtube, google Seoul BLEVE. There's a good one, IIRC, somewhere in Kansas where a rail car is blown a quarter mile.

In common language, an explosion is anything that goes boom. In technical talk, there are all sorts of levels of boom.

Conflagration would best describe the sparking off of twenty gallons of gas.

Steve

visit my blog at

[Steve B]

I sure thats 1 gallon of gasolene vapor not 1 ounce

reply: He's obviously not stating correct information. To say that a car cannot ignite from the force of a collision is plain ignorant. I saved a guy's life one time on the freeway. His car stalled, and he was rear-ended and boom, a fireball. We pulled him out through the driver's window.

I wish he would post the site where the equivalent of gasoline vapor to dynamite is stated by a professional.

I googled "gasoline vapor equals dynamite" and got this very knowledgeable answer that explains it all.

Too bad the other poster already knows everything, and won't allow any new information in, or information that is different than what he "thinks" he knows.

Steve

visit my blog at

[mm]

Absolutely. AFA the neighbor and I know, these could blow up and send shrapnel all over his yard. If that's possible, the OP should know it too, and if it's not, the OP shoould be able to relay this info to the neighbor. He'd be a fool not to raise the subject.

But those are are all little, separate tanks, vented gas tanks. If one goes, it won't take the others with it (except in action movies).

[FatterDumber& Happier Moe]

Just how smart is this neighbor? Free gas and you ought to put a case of beer with it.

[salty]

Rapid oxidation is the essential definition of explosion, Steve.

[salty]

Then why did the two people onboard land 30 feet away in the water with broken bones?

(they survived)

[Jim Elbrecht]

Or flame. We used to use pieces- 1/4 golf ball size?- to heat C-rations. It has been a *very* long time- but if I remember right a chunk would burn for 1/2 minute or so and boil a can of beans and franks. [too hot for the spaghetti & meatballs]

I never understood exactly what a detonator did -- but they scared the crap out of me. C4 was silly putty that burned.

-snip-

I note that the Wiki page says C4 will explode if stomped on while burning. That was 'common knowledge' in 1969 when I was a foolish lad of 18. We tried to detonate it by stomping & by throwing large rocks on it while burning. I never saw anything but a blasting cap detonate C4.

-snip-

What would be the term for the 'whoosh' of the vapors that can lift buildings off their foundations?

Gas is pretty safe-- it's the vapors that kill you.

Jim

[Evan]

Yes it is dangerous to keep that much gasoline stored in your backyard... Especially in gas cans... You never know what is going to happen to it, rather than it falling prey to some sort of spontaneous combustion, it is more likely that it will get spilled by someone creating a hazardous materials incident, or that it will be stolen, tampered with by someone adding something which will hurt your engines to it, or it could be set on fire as an act of arson/vandalism... You would be liable for leaving this gasoline out as at "attractive nuisance" if someone were to spill it or make use of it for arson...

If you want to store and haul more than 20 gallons of fuel at a time -- here is a question: I assume that you have some sort of a pick up truck to haul around your bikes and off-road vehicles... Yes ?

Purchase a "fuel transfer tank" for the bed of your pick-up truck... Like one of these:

You will need to obtain a permit for it and have it inspected periodically to transport that much fuel outside of the vehicles actual fuel tank...

That is the best way to go... Rather than having a collection of gasoline containers just hanging around in your yard...

~~ Evan

[Kurt Ullman]

No, to say that a car CAN ignite from the force of a collision is ignorant. The force of a collision can put a hole in the gas tank and the force (or more precisely the aftermath while the force of the collision is dissipated) can cause a spark that ignites the vapors escaping from said tank. But a car can not ignite merely from the force of the collision. Otherwise you could BBQ about every day on the highways of America in multiple places.

[Bill Murphy]

These are the new Blitz enviroflow cans. I don't think they have a safety release.

I guess they must, but they've been tested to not leak one bit subject to the hottest temperatures possible out in the sun for a year and they didn't lose an ounce (they measure gas loss by weight, not volume since it expands so much).

I always fill to the fill line and no more so I think there is no release (which I know is contrarian thinking) engineered into these cans.

I guess if someone artificially heats them to something over 200 degrees, they might have a release, but as far as I know, the tests show they hold their gas (the problem is getting it out, not keeping it in).

[Orak Listalavostok]

I'm sure fuel ignites, eventually, but I remember a MythBusters episode where they just couldn't get gasoline to light from a cigarette (IIRC).

OK. I looked it up. MythBusters Holleywood on Trial #7: It is possible to ignite a pool of gasoline using only a cigarette.

partly plausible

A cigarette has the potential to light a pool of gasoline but just doesn¢t have enough sustained heat. Gas ignites between 500 °F and 540 °F, the cigarette at its hottest was between 450 °F and 500 °F but only when it was actually being smoked. An ignition is very improbable.

[Judy Zappacosta]

But how do you get the clandestine 5 five gallon gas cans into the trunk at the gas station without anyone seeing you?