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Post by SWMan on Nov 14, 2020 23:57:10 GMT -6
I have a Westeel slip tank in my pickup, been with me since 2007 and probably over 300,000km on it now. Just recently it has a hairline crack along one of the corners about halfway up. If it's empty and lid is on can I weld that up with a stick welder? Any suggestion on which rod to use? Or am I asking for trouble?
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Post by slipclutch on Nov 15, 2020 7:03:45 GMT -6
Diesel tank? Fill it up to the top with diesel and start welding. Gas tank fill with water.
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tsipp
Junior Member
Spring valley, Saskatchewan
Posts: 98 Likes: 64
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Post by tsipp on Nov 15, 2020 7:08:56 GMT -6
Years ago I was welding a gas tank on my grain truck, so I had it off the truck and filled with water, a garden hose from the hydrant, the hydrant was set to keep the tank full and over flowing but just a trickle, well the wife walks by and shuts off the hydrant as she didn’t want me to waste water, of corse the garden hose started siphoning the tank dry, well that started a series of small explosions so I stopped welding and figured out the problem. I’m pretty sure the wife must’ve had a new life insurance policy on me.....
it all worked out in the end, I drained the water out and used her hair dryer and dried the remaining water out of the tank, I did use the stick welder.
I've seen people weld diesel tanks full of diesel, not a big deal just make sure it’s a slow leak and don’t make it a bigger leak but I’d drain it and use water. Just don’t have my wife around.
I've also heard of people using car exhaust or mig gas to void the tank of all oxygen before welding.
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Post by slipclutch on Nov 15, 2020 7:31:35 GMT -6
Lol. She wanted to get rid of you eh!
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Post by cptusa on Nov 15, 2020 8:35:51 GMT -6
I'm not much for welding on fuel tanks. Risk is not worth the reward. What's a new slip tank run? That's the value you're putting on your life. Many people do it and get away with it, a few don't.
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absk
New Member
Posts: 17 Likes: 8
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Post by absk on Nov 15, 2020 9:28:30 GMT -6
I’ve always stuck a hotsey wand in the tank, let it fill up and circulate for at least a hour then drain it out and weld it .. that’s on diesel tanks tho not sure how it would work for gas
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Post by Albertabuck on Nov 15, 2020 9:34:58 GMT -6
Depends on the shape of the tank and where the crack is how to approach it and I am going to assume it is for diesel. If its just a regular upright style Tidy tank, stand it on the opposite end and fill it with as much water as possible, make sure it is vented, and running an airline in it to purge the air helps too. You can't have anything wet where you are welding otherwise you will end up with a porous weld. I would also not recommend using a stick welder, like everything they aren't built like they used to be, best to MIG weld it. One question that needs to be answered, is why did it crack? That problem needs to be addressed as well.
I would imagine MB isn't far behind AB in the regs on those tanks, here we need to have them tied down and placarded if over 100 gallons, but the days of the single wall tanks are fast approaching. In fact on any industrial site or application, single wall are already banned. The double wall ones are pricey, but if you do step up to a new one, might as well bite the big one and go with the new style.
FYI I would not recommend buying one at RB, especially online without examining it first. I have seen more than one listed as double wall that wasn't.....and they sell for as much as new anyway.
Don't expect anyone else to weld it if you aren't willing to sit on the tank while they do it...lol
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Post by northernfarmer on Nov 15, 2020 10:34:07 GMT -6
I think if you called up a welding shop and posed your question along with your proposed method the welder on the other end of the line might have a stroke or heart attack, or if he has a good sense of humour he would agree that keeping the cap on would give you a bigger bang for the buck LOL. Be sure to keep the shop doors closed as well before you start welding ( local papers love to have a front page photo with an overhead door blown completely out of a building to go along with their story )
Oh I think you can take a little kidding SW !
I have an aluminum tank on a truck I still haven't dealt with as its a leak near the top so only becomes an issue if its completely full but I had called around to more then one local recommended welding shop and those particular shops had no interest in dealing with a fuel tank as they said they used to do so but turn jobs away now but that isn't to say there are no shops that still do that type of work. I knew someone who used to weld inside used fuel/crude tankers when they cracked and I have no idea how they prepped that but they had their approved methods but just costs a lot. For smaller tanks like that jockey tank the gist I was getting is that a shop who will work on tanks will first empty it, then wash it in the sense of getting the last bit of liquid fuel out, then steam the tank for some period of time to get as much out of the pores as possible but then its still not safe even yet as I "think" it was argon or at least some inert gas they fed into the tank in such a way that they knew all the oxygen was pushed out of the tank and they kept that product flowing into the tank the whole time they were welding so that zero oxygen was in the tank. So a whole bunch of prep time and $$$ before the tank would be welded and then after that pressure testing with very low pressure ( because that can be creating a pressure bomb if pressures are exceeded ) to make sure the tank is now leak free.
Like AB said with the stick welder, unless you are really good at it no doubt you may end up burning through or having porosity as those tanks are not very thick. Just start calling around to shops and you may find one that is used to doing such repairs and then get a quote and see if it makes sense to proceed.
I have an old jockey tank that developed a leak some years ago and its low on the tank around a drain bung at the edge of the factory weld and I took a metal repair product ( it wasn't JB weld but that would be the idea ) and cleaned up everything good and applied it and let that cure . Nope, didn't hold in this case as it seemed the tank flexes just enough that the product I used lifted in a spot so I figured I had nothing to loose by cleaning it up again although leaving what I had applied and then put a certain type of automotive silicone around that area and LOTS of it so it was a nice thick area with lots of bonding area surrounding the whole bung. Its held perfectly since which is rather laughable due to such a so called fix. But on a corner like you have it happening and its cracking along the length of the seam, I doubt slapping something on the surface would be the answer as the crack is happened for a reason and will no doubt keep on travelling along that seam.
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Post by SWMan on Nov 15, 2020 10:47:41 GMT -6
Well the tank holds 780 liters and I've probably got my money's worth out of it by now. My silicone fix actually held to get through the fall but I think the crack is elongating. If you guys saw the road I drive every day you'd probably wonder how it lasted this long. I have to put a word in for the GPI pump on there too which is the same age, and although it's slower it still works great.
I knew there was safety concerns with gas but sounds like diesel is risky too. Given my welding prowess I probably would end up doing it more than once, so factor in the time and it might make sense to buy a new one.
As always great advice on here, much appreciated!
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Post by shmiffy on Nov 15, 2020 10:48:00 GMT -6
No problem around here getting guys to weld fuel tanks. Some run exhaust in them for an hour then weld. Some steam them out.
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Post by generalchaos on Nov 15, 2020 12:54:48 GMT -6
When I welded my slip tank I asked the local welding shop. They said to hook up a hose to my exhaust pipe and let it run for a while. I used this same method to eliminate a skunk this spring that was hiding under our horse shed.😉
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Post by Beerwiser on Nov 15, 2020 13:41:34 GMT -6
My welder would fix the tank up too. He did a lot of plant work at one time also. He said when welding anything that had flammable material in it, it was steamed and filled with nitrogen. Exhaust works too, just need to be sure there is enough to purge the tank. On a side note, a heavy truck repair shop added a skylight to their shop this summer by welding on a Plains tanker. Guy was lucky to survive. Also had the county do the same while I was still working there.
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absk
New Member
Posts: 17 Likes: 8
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Post by absk on Nov 15, 2020 13:45:47 GMT -6
Talking about the welding process once I have it steamed out I take a thin zip cut and cut out the crack completely that way you have a gap to fill and a better chance of not leaking..like ab I also use a mig welder .. when done I rig up a regulator and put 2-3 psi on it and then check with soapy water from a spray bottle.. that way you know if it’s good it saves a lot of work from finding out the hard way
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Post by Albertabuck on Nov 15, 2020 13:50:09 GMT -6
Hard to beat those GPI pumps, IMO yep they expensive to buy, but they are worth it in the long run. There are two things that make them slow, first if you never clean the screen or use them to suck out of something, the strainer screen can eventually plug up. Secondly the nylon gears wear over time and you can get kits to rebuild them for a fraction of the cost of the pump. There are different models, and its important that the kit you get is for your pump. Dead giveaway you got grief with the gears is when it has trouble lifting from the bottom if you run it empty or has no lift trying to suck out of something else going the other way.
Another thing that can screw with any kind of high output pump is if the tank breather cap don't work properly. The one on the tank in my pickup is doing that, turn on the pump and before I can walk around to the other side to screw the cap off, the pump has already created enough vacuum where the tank is making noises, then she talks again as you screw the cap off.
Them old tidy tanks make good little feed and water troughs for like sick pens or in the barn, or small stock like sheep, I cut the 100 gal ones bit below the handles, top gives you a round bottom water trough that ice won't destroy and a rectangular feed trough with the bottom. Nice and light to handle too. Like any old fuel tank, make sure they are empty, leave it open to atmosphere for a few years and you can do whatever you want then with no worries at all.
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Post by northernfarmer on Nov 15, 2020 15:49:00 GMT -6
I bought a gear kit this fall for my GPI pump although the gears were not in bad shape but just wanted to make sure it was pumping to capacity and also put a better flowing auto nozzle on it from the prior one I had installed. Maybe I should have gone to another supplier but where I went they only sold a rebuild kit with all the orings etc and not just the gears and the face oring so was 60.00 or so for the kit. The Fillrite pumps seem to have taken over so much of the market that the GPI pump isn't as common as it once was. Also inspect the face plate of the pump for a grooved wear that the gear can create as well as back into the pump body as I understand more often then not its the face plate that will wear more and if its very bad you buy a new face plate that your fill hose screws into, they can be sanded down to renew the surface but that is a lot of work and requires a perfectly flat surface and full sheets of fine sand paper to accomplish it. I like the GPI because I can take the nozzle off and suck summer fuel out of trucks and tractors when winter comes, can't do that it seems with a vane pump that the Fillrite has from what I am told.
AB mentioned the fill cap on jockey tanks and I had mine stick on me internally over the summer as this fall I went to use it and barely started pumping and "boing" went the tank as the sides were being sucked in a bit so I got the pump off right away and spun the cap off to complete fueling. Then I took the cap apart and assuming the newer ones are similar to the older units there is the large diameter piston being pushed down by a spring and one can assume that is the valve and yes it is "A" valve which lets air out of the tank so it won't over pressure but the suction portion of the valve is in the center of that same disc. That little valve is not really an item that is meant to remove and doubt its a part that can be bought but typically all one has to do is push down through the breather holes for that little diaphragm with a small screw driver and carefully press down on the rubber disc inside to loosen it up as it happened to stick to its metal body assembly and that's all it was. Then I took some WD40 and who knows if that is good or bad but sprayed that into the little breather in the hopes that it will not stick again for a while.
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