dormant oil tank

kevin

I have a friend who bought a house 8 yrs. ago. The heating system had been converted from gas to oil w/ a Mitco burner.The oil tank had been left there w/ a bit of oil in the tank. He is now considering giong back to oil w/ a new boiler also.He cannot get an oil company to come out and see if the tank is ok. I am also wondering about the condition of the oil left in the tank.Two questions,Is there a good additive ie.(4in1 Hot) that could clean up the oil? And how do I best jude the integrity of a oil tank that is Twenty to 30 yrs. old and been dormant for 8 yrs?Thanks agian, kpc

ed wallace

oil tank

I would not even think about reuseing the old tank its been rusting away for eight yrs its better to replace than take a chance that it will not leak as to the remaining oil its probably all sludged up not worth the effort of cleaning and reuseing

To Learn More About This Contractor, Click Here to Visit Their Ad in "Find A Contractor"

J.C.A.

Kevin,

Ed gave some good advice . A tank that old is a risk . Could be the budge in the bottom is all that's keeping it all together . Do yourself and your bud a favor, get something new . Piece of mind is worth so much and environmental disasters of the home make no one happy . In the big picture , tanks are cheap . Remediation on the other hand.... Chris

heretic

Let it go

You would not believe how much sludge accumulates at the bottom of a tank after 30 years. Mine was from 1962 (so 40 years). Lots of water, and 3-4 inches of gelatinous sludge. It was a miracle that the outlet was still clear. Also, the steel on the bottom was getting thin.
If it was mostly empty for 8 years, large amounts of additional water probably condensed within it.
Any residual oil from 8 years ago is probably no good.
Even assuming that it could be cleaned up to a reasonable state, the effort involved in doing so would not be worthwhile.

billygoat22

I've been wondering too, reading some of the posts, how you would check the integrity of the tank. I've seen somewhere along the line you pressure test the tank and lines on installation. But if you test an old tank this way, what do you do if it fails and oil starts to leak?

ed wallace

oil tanks

i dont know of anyway to test the integrity of old tanks i try to advise customers if there tank is around 50yrs old to think about replacing it its not fun haveing a major oil leak in the house meet a guy at wetstock who was from no. carolina he tokd me that down there when they remove old underground tanks the pump them out then cut a hole in the top in order to clean out the sludge then spray rinoliner on the bottom of tank to keep them in one piece when they pull them out of the ground

To Learn More About This Contractor, Click Here to Visit Their Ad in "Find A Contractor"