Subject: Re: Repairing small/pinholes in oil reservoir tank?

From: PPIERCE <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Jul 1996 18:54:41 -0700

J. Kimberlin wrote:
> 
> In article <[email-masked]>, Adam Pierce <[email-masked]> wrote:
> >>The only proper way to fix the tank is cut out the rusty
> >>metal (where it is thin, of course) and then weld in
> >>a replacement section.  While you have the tank open,
> >>clean out as much rust as possible.
> >       My question was always the same as the one that was raised; how
> >is an explosion prevented? The procedure is to keep a considerable
> >amount of gas in the tank so as to eliminate as much air space as possible.
> >The remaining air space is filled with an inert gas such as nitrogen this
> >works but is expensive so the shop would attach a hose to the exhaust pipe of
> >an old smoky engine and the other end to the gas tank and ran the engine for
> >about 15 minutes this eliminated enough oxygen to prevent any problems. This
> >technique sounds scary as hell but they have not blown themselves up in over
> >30 years of using this technique and I guess that they will keep on doing it
> >that way for at least the next 30.
> 
> I had some welding done once and at the shop, which was outside, there
> were a couple of gas tanks that needed repairs.  The gas tanks were first
> filled with hot water, left to sit for 10 minutes or so, then drained.
> Then, they would light a sheet of paper rolled up and give it to a guy who
> would run past the tank and shove the lighted paper into the filler
> nozzle.  The tanks I saw went *whump* and had 2 feet of flame, but did
> not distort.  Then the welder went at it with oxy-acet.  I was suitably
> scared sh*tless when I saw what they were going to do.  But evidently
> this was common practice.  The gasoline sold there was 72 octane - not
> very volatile, actually, and the altitude was 7600 feet.
> 
> Now, I have to say that I saw this in 1963 in Asmara, Eritrea which was
> part of Ethiopia at that time and not a separate country as it is today.
> I don't know if this sort of activity has anything to do with being fleet
> of foot, but an Ethiopian lady won the marathon and an Ethiopian man is
> also doing good in the current olympics.  I'll bet their technique for
> welding gas tanks has not changed, and they are certainly good runners.
> 
> JerryK

My $0.02 worth---

Watched a guy braze a tank on a farm tractor.  He'd drained the gasoline 
out and ran an air line in the tank for some period of time (I'd have it 
for a week) then proceeded to braze away.  He said he'd done it that way 
for many years.  The mizture was too lean to pop...

Paul in AJ AZ

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From: [email-masked] (Scott Logan)
Date: 31 Jul 1996 11:58:56 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, From [email-masked] (J. 
Kimberlin), the following was written:
> Ethiopian lady won the marathon and an Ethiopian man is 
> welding gas tanks has not changed, and they are certainly good 
> runners.> .

I'm betting that's WHY the Ethipoians are such good runners <vbg>!

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