Don't store a B-tank in your trunk!!

Paul Pollets

<a href="http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Thunderous-blast-rips-car-to-shreds-in-Vancouver-BC-208508231.html">http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Thunderous-blast-rips-car-to-shreds-in-Vancouver-BC-208508231.html</a>

Steve Whitbeck

Bang

What they don't tell you is that he probably didn't turn the tank off.

Always make sure to turn the tank off.  The hose can go bad and leak badly.

Acetylene tank should be stored vertical also. Acetylene gas is unstable - that is why it is absorbed into acetone gel inside the tank. If you use too big of a torch head you can get the acetone to come out with the gas. BE SAFE - TURN THE TANK OFF

heatpro02920

a while back

When I was working out of a van {now I can not operate with out a utility body} I used to always shut off my tanks {kind of a stickler for it}, well I swear I shut the tank but I come out of my house in the morning and I could smell it outside the van, so I didn't want to open the door in fear the dome light would ignite the gas...



The window was cracked about a half inch, I went up to the van and sniffed in the window, IT WAS STRONG, so I called a good friend of mine who was a fireman, he said not to open the door and he would be rite over, he pulls up with a firetruck no lights {it was 6am}, they wanted to break my window but instead jimmied the sliding door window open, then they installed a hose going to a fan and sucked the air out of the van... About 5 minutes later all the gas was gone, the tank was empty and I went to work... Sorry its not real exciting with explosions and police chases but just a lesson on why to double check the valve, because I know I shut it when I was done with it, but it got opened some how from the house to the van...

Jean-David Beyer

Acetylene story: No Bang here either.

When I was a kid, I was in France and saw a guy welding a guard rail on a bridge. He had a gas torch and a tank providing the acetylene. No oxygen, it used atmospheric air and the acetylene came from a very low pressure tank (galvanized sheet metal) with water in it and a basket containing calcium carbide. When he wanted the gas, he operated a lever that put the basket into the water. Primitive. The torch tended to smoke (not enough oxygen,  I guess).

Solid_Fuel_Man

Same thing here

I was talking to an old timer had he lived in a place with no electricity when he was a kid.  They had the same think in the basement (calcium carbide and water bath) it was in a tank and you operated the basket by a rod that went through the floor to the tank in the basement.  The gas was piped to gas lights via......rubber hose and copper tubing!  Wow, and he said they used it all the time, you could get the calcium carbide at the general store.  WOW, how times have changed.

Taylor

bob eck

Exploding truck

One of my customers a P&H contractor most of his men take their trucks home. I stopped one Friday morning to make a sales call. One of his nice clean green work trucks with side panels and storage bins was blown apart like a bomb went off. I asked the owner what happened. He told me his worker used the B tank or mapp tank the day before and put it away like always at the end of the day. Next morning his worker was walking to his truck and hit the remote door opener and that turned on lights inside the truck and in the storage bins. It exploded and the door just missed him as it went flying by. Guess the tank was leaking all night. You do need to be careful with these tanks. Thank God no one was hurt.