Diesel tank cleaning
Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2018 12:56 pm
Hi all, I had a great trip back from Hawaii to SF a couple of weeks ago. Quite and adventure. The trip involved a lot of motoring, I think I put 180 + hours on my 2GM20F. She ran like a top for the duration although I did snang rope or some kind of debris on two occasions. This basically slowed the engine to a near stop. I immediately stopped the boat and was able to back down sucessfully. In both cases, whatever it was was cleared and off I went...thank goodness. I was not looking forward to going for a swim, that is for sure.
Anyway, I am now home and am going to open my tank inspection port for a look see. I did this prior to departure from Hawaii and saw a small amount of liquid, I assume water, at the very bottom of the tank near the uptake tube. My current technique for gettong this out with fuel in the tank is to put a 1/4 inch flexible tube into the area and basically suck the fluid into the tube for deposit in a waste container. I am basically using the tube as a straw. Now, this works OK but if I overdo the suction, I wind up with a moth full of diesel fuel. Even if that does not happen, my tube gets diesel on it and the residue winds up in my mouth...yuk! I wonder if anyone has an idea how I could do this without the mouthful of diesel? Maybe a big syringe type thing - but what to buy and where to buy one??
Of course the other thing I need to do is stop the water getting in there. I seem to have made good progress on that front. During the 2650 NM passage back to the mainland I was meticulous about carefully refueling from the 18 each 5 gal jugs I went through. I chose times when the weather deck was dry or at least not taking water. After each refuel I would apply a coating of silicone grease to the gap around the perko fuel fill port when the cap was screwed down. The grease simply filled the very narrow gap around the cap which, in theory, is sealed by an o ring. It sounds like a hassle but the sealing process took about 30 seconds. Apply the grease with a finger pressing it into the gap, wipe the excess with a paper towel and go. I plan to do this at every refuelling from now on. Very easy and quick to accomplish. The Perko O ring is in good shape so the grease is secondary protection but it does seem to ensure that no moisture gets past that cap.
The other thing I noticed isthe engine actually started bettter - first crank - after a lot of motoring. It was kind of amazing. I wonder if that motoring somehow cleaned the carbon out of the engine or ??? The engine now has about 1450 hours on it. The boat abd engine are now 32 years old. At this rate it should last for the rest of my life and some...
I wrote a report on the trip if anyone is interested. Find it here
http://sfbaysss.org/forum/showthread.ph ... Jacqueline
Anyway, I am now home and am going to open my tank inspection port for a look see. I did this prior to departure from Hawaii and saw a small amount of liquid, I assume water, at the very bottom of the tank near the uptake tube. My current technique for gettong this out with fuel in the tank is to put a 1/4 inch flexible tube into the area and basically suck the fluid into the tube for deposit in a waste container. I am basically using the tube as a straw. Now, this works OK but if I overdo the suction, I wind up with a moth full of diesel fuel. Even if that does not happen, my tube gets diesel on it and the residue winds up in my mouth...yuk! I wonder if anyone has an idea how I could do this without the mouthful of diesel? Maybe a big syringe type thing - but what to buy and where to buy one??
Of course the other thing I need to do is stop the water getting in there. I seem to have made good progress on that front. During the 2650 NM passage back to the mainland I was meticulous about carefully refueling from the 18 each 5 gal jugs I went through. I chose times when the weather deck was dry or at least not taking water. After each refuel I would apply a coating of silicone grease to the gap around the perko fuel fill port when the cap was screwed down. The grease simply filled the very narrow gap around the cap which, in theory, is sealed by an o ring. It sounds like a hassle but the sealing process took about 30 seconds. Apply the grease with a finger pressing it into the gap, wipe the excess with a paper towel and go. I plan to do this at every refuelling from now on. Very easy and quick to accomplish. The Perko O ring is in good shape so the grease is secondary protection but it does seem to ensure that no moisture gets past that cap.
The other thing I noticed isthe engine actually started bettter - first crank - after a lot of motoring. It was kind of amazing. I wonder if that motoring somehow cleaned the carbon out of the engine or ??? The engine now has about 1450 hours on it. The boat abd engine are now 32 years old. At this rate it should last for the rest of my life and some...
I wrote a report on the trip if anyone is interested. Find it here
http://sfbaysss.org/forum/showthread.ph ... Jacqueline