Archived water in fuel tanks,,,Alcohol ???

[Otis Calhoun]

Got some bad fuel a few weeks ago . I can see water on the bottom of the tank in the bed. Fuel filters plug up quicker than normal. I assume I have water in the truck tank also as the fuel goes from the in bed tank to the truck tank via a transfer pump. I was thinking about pumping the fuel out of both tanks . I can get all the fuel out of the in bed tank and I can get what will come out from the truck tank buy pumping it out with the lift pump (Im doing a relocation kit on it anyway) my question is would there be any harm in running 2 gallons of alcohol through the truck tank after pumping it empty as much as possible with the lift pump then pumping out the alcohol. There would be some left in the tank . If I was to fill the tank with 15 gals of diesel would the small amount of remaining alcohol cause any problems? Thanks Otis

 

[rrausch]

Well, alcohol will dilute the lubricity of the diesel fuel. If that was my only option I'd add something like Stanadyne Lubricity Formula or Power Formula.



But alcohol also evaporates pretty fast. When I bought my alum. 45 gallon aux. tank it was real dusty on the inside. I cleaned it out with water real good, then drained as much water out as I could and sloshed some denatured alcohol around in the tank and then poured that out and let it dry real good.



The thing I don't know is if alcohol will harm any of the inside tank components or fuel lines or anything.

 

[Otis Calhoun]

In regaurd to the in bed tank . I siphoned it down to about 1 quart with a small hose and the truck jacked up front and rear center so I could rock it back and forth. There was what appeared to be a 50-50 mix of water and fuel left that would not siphone out . I put 4 quarts of alcohol in it and rocked the truck to mix everthing. whatever was left didnt realy mix at all , it just bubled into a foam. I siphoned this mix back down to a quart and added onther quart of alcohol,rocked it arond and got as much out as possable then Im letting it dry with both caps off and a fan blowing over one of the fill holes . the tank has 2 so there is a little air circulation going through the tank. what I dont understand it why the one quart of fuel -water mix did not combine with the gallon of 70% isopropal alcohol that I put in . just got this wered foam stuff. anyway I probly got about a gallon of water out of a 80 gallon tank. I think the only practical thing to do to the trucks tank is to just pull it out and clean it .

 

[Alan Reagan]

Not just any alcohol will remove water in the fuel. I think the type you have to use is an anhydrous isopropanol.