Fuel Levels

[Bat & Frog]

Hi All, Our fuel tank does not have a fuel gauge, how does one tell how much fuel is in the tank, and is it easy / how does one retrofit a sender unit or gauge. At present the only option is a cane to dip tank.

Thanks

[saltysplash]

At present the only option is a cane to dip tank.

Thanks

 

 

That tends to be the industry standard method.

[ChrisPy]

There are previous threads about tank level sensing, but Salty's 'standard industry method' is fit-for-purpose and simple.

 

Gadget men always want some thin wires and flashing instruments, however.

Edited August 8, 2009 by ChrisPy

[steelaway]

That tends to be the industry standard method.

 

 

Yep ! Me too.

Although mines a nice piece of hardwood graduated at 20ltr stages.

 

Alex

[RLWP]

Yep ! Me too.

Although mines a nice piece of hardwood graduated at 20ltr stages.

 

Alex

 

Mine is painted with matt black blackboard paint and has a nice rope handle worked on it.

 

Richard

[David Schweizer]

On our boat any dip stick would have to be about a metre long and capable of bending through two 110 degree bends, so the "industry standard" is not always applicable. Retro fitting a sender unit would also involve major disruption, so we resort to the time honoured method of keeping a record of how many hours the engine has run since the last refill, and re-fueling when the calculatiions suggest that the tank is 2/3rds empty.

 

It is quite easy to calculate an average fuel consumption figure by re-fuelling several times after comparatively short cruising periods and dividing the number of Litres consumed by the number of hours cruised to obtain average litres per hour figure. Subsequent calcuklations will help to confirm the average figure. On our boat this varies between 1.05 lph to 1.3 lph , depending on how hard we have been running the engine, and how deep the canal has been.

[Yoda]

On our boat any dip stick would have to be about a metre long and capable of bending through two 110 degree bends, so the "industry standard" is not always applicable. Retro fitting a sender unit would also involve major disruption, so we resort to the time honoured method of keeping a record of how many hours the engine has run since the last refill, and re-fueling when the calculatiions suggest that the tank is 2/3rds empty.

 

It is quite easy to calculate an average fuel consumption figure by re-fuelling several times after comparatively short cruising periods and dividing the number of Litres consumed by the number of hours cruised to obtain average litres per hour figure. Subsequent calcuklations will help to confirm the average figure. On our boat this varies between 1.05 lph to 1.3 lph , depending on how hard we have been running the engine, and how deep the canal has been.

 

That's pretty good, about 10 litres a day. Your engine is in good condition.

[LoneWolf]

I use a metal tape measure as a dipstick - already calibrated innit and compact to store

 

And log the number of hours cruised, but i've only filled up twice so far so have no idea how big the tank is

[ditchcrawler]

Yep ! Me too.

Although mines a nice piece of hardwood graduated at 20ltr stages.

 

Alex

Same here

[David Schweizer]

That's pretty good, about 10 litres a day. Your engine is in good condition.

I would hope so, it is a BMC 1.5 which was completely re-built three years ago. It has just clocked up 700 hours.

Edited August 9, 2009 by David Schweizer

[Bat & Frog]

Happy with a dipstick, as we have only been out 3 times I was wondering how low to go with the tank, don't fancy pushing her home and not sure RAC would oblige !

[FadeToScarlet]

It depends where your outlet pipe for the diesel is. Mine is about 4 inches (which I believe is quite a lot) above the actual bottom of the tank, so that any muck and detritus doesn't get though to the filter.

 

I can see the pipe coming out of the tank, which is built into the back of the counter.

 

This is the most crucial thing to know, when running the engine!

 

I've got a piece of dowel with a big slot marked in, to show the minimum level in the tank. I've also marked on the consumption between some local landmarks, and I know that going from, say, Upware to Cambridge will use nearly 2cm of diesel if I'm running the engine hard.

[rjs]

We have a duel use aluminium dip stick - diesel one side and WC on the other

 

Richard

[ChrisPy]

We have a duel use aluminium dip stick - diesel one side and WC on the other

 

Richard

so that's where the diesel bug is breeding!