Help draining fuel from old tank

[laserbrn]

My Skipjack is leaking gasoline into the hull/bilge. I can smell it and I can see it. There's quite a bit of it. I need to get all of it out obviously.

I bought an electric fuel pump, ran LOOOOOOOOOOOOONG electrical wires to a battery WAY up high on the roof of my house ( I'm overly cautious and there's a lot of fumes). The fuel line on the fuel pump is a little smaller in diameter than the line coming from the tank. The line coming from the tank is larger and doesn't make a great seal around this el cheapo fuel filter that I bought. I tried zip tying it to get a better seal, but it's really just no good.

I was going to run to the autoparts store after dinner, but I just had a thought and I was hoping someone here could help.

This entire idea of using an electric pump is just flat out dangerous I'm feeling in my situation. There's a lot of gas....I don't know if I've said that, lol. Can I just use a fuel line setup for an outboard and just pump it out manually into containers? Seems a WHOLE lot safer and I'm not really seeing why it wouldn't work. I was even thinking of finding the drain plug on this boat, running the fuel line up through the bilge and pumping it that way as it I was thinking it would work like a siphone if it was well below the tank right?

Am I crazy or should this work? I'd rather run to walmart and grab that rig and not feel at risk of fire or explosion.

 

[UncleWillie]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

A couple of items to consider....

The fuel pump will never pull the fuel uphill to the roof.
Zip ties are no substitute for real HOSE CLAMPS.

Siphoning works great going downhill, however....
The fuel line from your fuel tank to the engine has an Anti-Siphon device on the tank end.
Its purpose is to prevent fuel from filling the bilge if the fuel line breaks.
The fuel pump has enough suction to open the valve but gravity will not do it alone.

I will assume the boat is outside away from the house and not in the garage. If it isn't, stop reading this and go move it NOW!
It actually takes a considerable concentration of gasoline fumes to reach the point where is is flammable.
It is highly unlikely you will ever reach that level outside with any breeze at all.
The concentration INSIDE the bilge is another story. Run the blower and get a portable fan to flush out the boat.

Using real Hose clamps, Extend the fuel line out the transom plug hole to the fuel pump on the ground (Outside!) and pump the fuel into your containers.

Be careful, fire extinguisher and garden hose handy? (For hosing spilled fuel)
Don't get overly paranoid about the gas smell, it is harder to ignite than you might think.

 

[laserbrn]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

Thanks...that's pretty funny the misunderstanding. I'm not trying to pump the fuel up to the roof of my house, ran the electrical up there as far from the bilge as possible so that when I hooked it to a battery if it sparked it wouldn't be an issue (gas vapor is heavier than air).

To be clear, the boat is outside, not terribly far from the house, but it's not enclosed at all. It's out in the open and I took the cover off and aired it out. I guess a mix of both of these solutions probably is best. I'll get some real hose clamps or some kind of coupler to change the size to the smaller size, drain what's in the bilge (yuck) and run the fuel line out through the bottom of the bilget to the pump where it sucks it out.

Thanks...that seems like sound advice.

Now the only problem is that I can't find the drain plug. I know that sounds crazy, but I'm looking all over and just flat out don't see the drain plug. Now I'm getting annoyed....hmmmmmm...

 

[UncleWillie]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

Just to avoid the funny misunderstandings...
You are looking for the bilge drain on the outside of the hull and NOT on the inside? :facepalm:
There should not be many fitting below the waterline, the one that is plugged is the drain.
The others go to the live wells or the engine.

---------------

I was picturing the pump on the roof hooked by looooong wires to a battery on the ground and you were concerned with the pump starting the fire.

 

[laserbrn]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

I know this sounds funny, but yeah, I'm looking where the drain plug usually is....lol. This is my 3rd boat, I know it's usually on the transom below the bilge, lol. I'll take some pictures, but I'm thinking this boat doesn't have one. I'm not sure how crazy that is...but it suuuuuure seems to be the case. It's dark out there right now, but I'll see if I can get a picture.

 

[laserbrn]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

The bottom paint is in pretty rough shape. I need to clean it all up, but you can see there's no drain plug in what I would consider to be the "normal" place.

This transom was rebuilt/reglassed when the engine was changed from twins to single engine. Is it likely that during this time the drain plug "feature" was removed because the original owner kept the boat in the marina? I suppose anything is "possible" but the glass work looks really good and I just can't imagine someone would be okay with that.

I'm kind of scared of how I'm going to clean out the bilge now. That is the project after I get the gas out of this boat...clean the bilge up as best I can and see how much maintenance is needed in that area. Without a drain plug it seems it'll be a bit more difficult. Just keep pumping it out? When I get the outrdrive and motor off of this boat, should I have someone install a damn drain plug?

 

[Ned L]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

It is quite possible that the hull drain plug was eliminated when the transom was rebuilt. To your idea of using an 'outboard' fuel line, yes that will work. Additionally, if you put the container that you are transfering the gas to on the ground outside the boat (lower than the boat's tank) once you get the flow started with the primer bulb the gas will continue to flow on its own without having to continue speezing the primer bulb. (you will have a siphon going). This will work even if you have to run the line up over the gunwale.

 

[laserbrn]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

Well, I pulled the fuel line off of the existing fuel pump that runs to the tank. I don't think I have access to the sender to put the tube in there. The anti-siphon valve on the tank will certainly stop the siphon from working. I'm sure there's on there seeing as how I wouldn't want the bilget to fill with gasonline in the event of a fuel line failure.

I will just have to bail out the gas that's currently in the bilge, drain the tank and try to clean up that mess under there. I'm curious to see how the stringers/bilge area look around there now. I'm 99% sure it was clean when I bought the boat at the marina, but it sure is nasty now. So a hose some pumpage and we should be good to go. I may even install a drain plug before I bother trying to clean it out for ease. I suppose the pump will pump most of it out once it's not full of fuel and it's mostly water.

 

[oldman570]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

I have had to put a thru hull drain on a few boats when I have had done transom work donon them. I used a thru hull drain fitting like what is on the livewells and put it in reversed with the nut on the outside then cut the extra threads off. Use a good silacon on the fitting to transom area to make sure it will seal up everthing. Then get a plug of the right size, to plug off the hole in the fitting.
Oldman570

 

[laserbrn]

Re: Help draining fuel from old tank

So....I sprayed some water in the bilge and threw in some palmolive...I pumped it out with the bilge pump. Scary moments, lol. Once I cleared it out twice I just left that alone for the time being. I got all that crap into a 5 gallon container so it was probably 2-3 gallons of solid gasoline sitting down there before I added some water.

I hooked up a fuel pump to the fuel tank with the container on the ground over the side of the trailer and a long hose running up to the boat. Just pumped it out just fine. I had to stop after 10 gallons because I only have 3x 5 gallon containers. This is also the max that I can take to the disposal place at a time and even though the tank is leaking I think it's still the safest place to store the remainder of the fuel. I can take these 3 containers down tomorrow and I'll leave them out overnight and grab them in the morning. Put them in our warehouse at work, take'em down at lunch time.

Hopefully I can keep the containers when I dispose of the gas and I'll rinse and repeat tomorrow afternoon. I can't imagine there was 30 gallons of gasoline in this tank, but then again how little would you leave sitting in it in a marina?

Thanks for the help guys, I'm not out of the woods yet and to put the fumes into perspective...my neighbor came out to see what was going on. He was overwhelmed by the smell at his front door step, so yeah, lots o' fumes, but lots of care and taking my time, fire extinguishers on the boat, next to both sides of the boat and the garden hose on and running with sprayer nozzle. I know I'm paranoid, but it's also my house...so ya know, my whole life.