I'm looking out for a good way to carry extra fuel, everything from oversize or more stock fuel tanks to bed tanks to maybe 55 gal drums. My goal is to be able to transport 150gal.


Up for any advice, options and local suppliers, adds you see, stuff you got etc.

Need to do this cheap, saving money is the primary goal.

Edit, why would I want to do such a thing.
Fred Meyer has a new deal, up to $1 off per gallon. But cause of how it works I can probably only get that once, and if they keep offering it then once every couple of months. They will let you buy up to $500 worth at a time. So at a buck off diesel at my local freddies right now would be 3.05/gal. $500 at $3.05/gal is 165 gallons. So if I can find a place to pump 165 gallons into I can save $165

 

Not a bad plan. so you are basically looking for spare fuel tanks, drums, or anything to hold diesel? Or are you looking at 55G drums specifically?

EDIT: found this on CL.
http://seattle.craigslist.org/oly/for/3721774860.html

Maybe trade something for it or offer a few bucks?

EDIT2: here is another with one plastic and one metal up for bartering.
seattle.craigslist.org/kit/bar/3698923222.html

 

Funny thing I was just looking for a tank also.
I was thinking maybe a 250 gal furnace storage tank would work.

But I have to watch out in my case diesel is good for 6 Mo.
in good storage conditions. The 6.0L is not as easy to keep
happy with old diesel as the older trucks.
I think I use about 1500 gals a year.

Sean

 

Thanks, I picked up a few good 55Gal drums. I was looking at tanks for in the bed but they were pricey and really not the right size. If paying that much gunna have to be perfect.

Anywho came to 2 conclusions, that I need to just make custom tanks and that my plan to save a $1 a gallon don't work anyway. To save a buck a gal I need 1000 points and you get 1 point per dollar spent. But the points don't add up from month to month, so I'd have to spend $1000 at Fred Meyer in a month, uhm not gunna do that.

Still want a lot of capacity so I can buy when cheap but no rush.

 

I'm more then happy to take old diesel, used motor oil and used ATF off you or anyone elses hands

 

What do you do with the used oil and ATF?

 

With my basic old diesel I can use it as fuel.

 

As far as volume goes, one cubic foot holds 7.48 gallons. So for 150 gallons, your looking at 20.05 cubic feet of storage. If diesel is equal to water. Ummmm that's a lot. I only have one tank. It's the "frame rail" type. If I added three more it would still be less than 80 gallons as my tank is a 19 gal tank. So with that said, if I added four more tanks, and just for a visual say I piggy backed them under the first four tanks. If my math is right that would be 152 gal.
I would look at a fuel bladder type of thing. But to be able to get that on the cheap whole other story.
I know you said that you nixed the 150 gal idea. It just started to wonder just how big it would actually be.

 

Wow, I did not know that.

 

Yeah I did the math on that to, I was looking at picking up a tank that was 24"x24"x46" It would hold about 110 gallons.

I would love a fuel bladder system, but damn those things are expensive. If you got a way to get one at a reasonable price I'd love to hear it.

 

Sorry BF, I don't. I was in aviation in the military and have got fuel from them and thought how cool is that. My helicopters stub wings had a bladder in each as well and the bottom 1/3 was able (in theory) to take direct hits and reseal.
Although now I wonder how much those farm truck tanks hold. You know the one I mean? They sit next to the cab in the bed. Have a gas station type handle.

 

Diesel is a quality fuel Basically if it will ignite under compression (but not predetonate) it can be used as fuel in a diesel.

Funny story about oil in diesels, some of the old Detroit diesels had issues with the superchargers. If they were not maintained correctly, the engines would suck the oil seals from the supercharger in, and then start sucking in the engine oil. Once it got to this point there was no way to stop it, and they would just run until it ran out of oil.

The biggest thing I worry about with doing that in mine is getting all the particulate matter out of the oil. Josh said he went and got a junkyard oil pump, mounted it to a board, got a good filter, and hooked a drill up to the driveshaft of the pump. That way he could run the oil/aft through a filter.

 

i did say that, roughly. i started with a power steering pump off a toyota pickup, belt driven by a 1/3hp motor. worked well until the pump got some gunk in it, then even after disassembly and cleaning, it just won't work anymore.
then i grabbed an engine oil pump powered by a drill, pushing oil first into a 6.9 filter head, then from there into one of those cheap plastic fuel filters, which filter a good bit finer than the first filter in the system, and from there into clean oil bottles, which are then poured into the truck. i've probably filtered 100 gallons on this system, and never had to change the 6.9 filter, but have plugged up several of the cheap $3 clear ones that are after it.

i burn used engine oil, ATF, gear oil, and whatever else finds its way into my barrel.

but recently it has come to my attention that my tank selector valve doesn't want to switch now that i have about a 50% mix in the rear tank. i'm stuck on the front tank until it chooses to switch, which might be another couple of days. its done this to me before, and always works itself out eventually

as for tanks, old chevies had the tanks mounted outside of the frame rail on both sides, and i always wondered if i could adapt a couple of those onto a ford for extra capacity, but i never got around to experimenting with it. but that would potentially give you a front stock tank of 19 gallons, a rear bronco tank of 38 gallons, and 2 chevy tanks of probably 16 or so gallons each. if the numbers i'm throwing around are correct and practical, thats 89 gallons.
yes, i have thought about this before, back when i was driving my f250 all the time, it drank too much!

 

Good ideas Josh, I do need to track down a bronco tank and convert it to diesel. Was thinking I'd take the front/left side tank and put one on the right side.

 

the stock muffler sits right in the way of your proposed second front tank, so unless you re-arrange your exhaust, that might be a bit of a slowdown for your progress.

of course, i don't have much room to add tanks on the van, cause the interior is full, outboard of the left frame rail has a battery box, outboard of the right frame rail has stuff relating to the sliding door, so the only space i really could claim would be right where the exhaust sits, but the engine and driveline all sit offset to the right, so i don't think there would be room for a factory tank to fit on that side. things are more centered in a pickup, so that might work for you. i guess you need to get down there with a tape measure and look around

with extra tanks proposed everywhere, we have to decide to either have 3 TSV's or a couple transfer pumps to make all that fuel useful to us. i would lean toward a transfer pump over an extra TSV, because we're always afraid to drive on the last 5 gallons in the tank, and that concern is eliminated with a transfer pump.