Tank Installation (was Domestic heating oil tank blockage)

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Reply to
Bruno
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id have put it on some blocks so the pipework didn't get into the damp ground except as a bit of plastic covered pipe.

Other wise its no worse than most

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Well clear the crap away, carefully just in case that rusty tank connector is even more fragile than it looks.

Is that shut off valve on it's side between the sight glass connection and tank?

Manual sight valve in the "open" position, they should be left "closed". If the sight glass(*) fails, the oil in tank "finds its level" with the failure...

(*) These days poly tubing that the oil does attack over time, discoloring and hardening, failure is likely at the joint/nipple to valve assembly.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

Is it supposed to be sitting on the earth with a risk of being pierced by rocks? Not to mention the pipe joints rusting away...

Now if it were on a bed of soft sand, maybe...

Reply to
Tim Watts

I expect the installation guide says on a base of level 3x2 paving slabs extending out 1' either side of the tank. Mine certainly did.

Seen plenty of them installed like that direct on the soil though.

Reply to
Martin Brown

Is it? I thought it was sitting on the concrete hard standing.

The instructions attached to our tank have it sat on 3 x 2' paving slabs over the entire base area.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

I'd have thought it would be best practice to raise the tank up off the ground, if only so the piping/filter housing (which I don't seem to have) can be better protected from corrosion. It would also make it easier to syphon the dregs out of the tank when necessary. As things stand in the pictures I posted, there's no difference in level so a pump of some sort would be needed. If I have to go for a new installation I'll make damn sure it's raised off the ground this time.

Reply to
Bruno

The only reason it needs to be raised off the ground is for a full gravity feed system to ensure the oil level is higher than the intake - otherwise you have to use a weird oil lifter like mine or a tiger loop. It means having one more thing to go wrong.

Remember that any replacement tank today will almost certainly have to be a bunded one and at least twice the volume = 1.3x linear dimensions.

Not embedded in bare soil is good but raised above ground level is only necessary if the system is gravity feed and a bit marginal on height.

Reply to
Martin Brown

There's already a tiger loop in circuit. No idea what they do, but the bloke who fitted the boiler told me I should have one. I'd like the next tank off the ground so I can syphon out the dregs/water principally, but the extra pressure will certainly be welcome too.

"Bunded" - I've heard that term a lot. Isn't it just a fancy word for "double-skinned"? What benefit does it confer? Just curious....

Reply to
Bruno

So infrequent as to be not worth worrying about. As others have said you can get something ona bit of string that you lob in, it absorbs the water then you pull it out. Filters take care of any cack that gets to the outlet for the few hours after a filling has given it a good stir.

Pumps will lift a bit, the tricky bit is getting air out of the line if the level is low or below that of the pump.

A "bund" is a leak proof secondary containment that can hold the entire contents of the primary containment. If you look at large storage tanks they will have a built surround to contain the full contents of the tank(s) should there be a leak. A bunded tank is a bit more than just double skined. The requirement is there to stop up to 2,500 l (in our case) of kerosene getting into ("polluting") the enviroment.

Reply to
Dave Liquorice

It is in essence a tank within a tank so that if the fuel leaks it is still contained and in theory an alarm goes off. I wonder about how well it will work in practice since to my eyes the outer bunding tank is exposed to UV, sunshine and rapid temperature changes and will become age embrittled long before the inner tank fails.

You basically have a tank where only half of the volume holds fuel.

At least with a plastic tank it doesn't quietly etch away from the inside water boundary until one day it fails catastrophically.

Reply to
Martin Brown

/Martin Brown

- show quoted text - It is in essence a tank within a tank so that if the fuel leaks it is still contained and in theory an alarm goes off. /q

No alarm on mine or others I know of....

Jim K

Reply to
JimK

if the bund is leak-proof, why not make the primary containment from it, then you wouldn't need any secondary containment :-P

Reply to
Andy Burns

It's more complicated than that. It's there to handle the situation where the primary containment has failed and doesn?t need to be leak proof over the same time when it doesn?t have the oil in it.

Reply to
john james

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