I got tanks... Now what?

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NE Poultry Supply

NE Poultry Supply

New Member
Aug 18, 2015
42
Southern Maine
Any lessons already learned?

I found a source or decommissioned propane tanks. Had to call all over New England but I got them.

I think I will be stacking them (2 500s for 1000 gal storage).

What is the best way to go about it-
Transporting?
Preperation (How much should I expect to pay a welder? to add the valves and staking brackets)?
Moving it into place (how many people to move 900# tanks?
 
I had access to a trailer to haul them with, and a front end loader to move them around with when they got here. I stacked them with that just outside my basement door, on dollies, then rolled them right into place and worked them off the dollies with a combination of floor jack, pallet jack, pry bars & blocks. (Some pics in my install thread in my sig). Preparation, I pressure washed them out with a bent wand (don't think I had to, they were pretty clean), after leaving open in yard with wind blowing thru them for a couple weeks (don't think I had to do that either but anyway). Then I marked on them with a sharpie where I wanted fittings welded & what to weld, and loaded up again & trucked them to my welder along with fittings I got at the plumbing supply house. Went back & got them when he finished. Charged a couple hundred. Couple hints - make sure you don't get cast fittings (I thought I got good ones but accidentally ended up with a couple cast ones that caused problems later - try using 12" black iron nipples cut in half), and don't get any more fittings put on than necessary. See what they come with & make use of those best you can & go from there. You can see in my pics, but I didn't get any stacking brackets welded on - I just used some 6x & 4x lumber. Was easier for me to do that. Some have stacked on pallet racking too. If you can get them home & in place, you could get them welded together while they're at the shop, but they're a lot harder to move around after that. Even stacking my 330s was a bit tricky, things are heavy and like to roll around.

And another hint - don't bother painting them. I did that, and they sure looked sexy after, but did they ever stink the house up after I got heat in them. I did use cheap paint though...
 
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maple1 said:
I had access to a trailer to haul them with, and a front end loader to move them around with when they got here. I stacked them with that just outside my basement door, on dollies, then rolled them right into place and worked them off the dollies with a combination of floor jack, pallet jack, pry bars & blocks. (Some pics in my install thread in my sig). Preparation, I pressure washed them out with a bent wand (don't think I had to, they were pretty clean), after leaving open in yard with wind blowing thru them for a couple weeks (don't think I had to do that either but anyway). Then I marked on them with a sharpie where I wanted fittings welded & what to weld, and loaded up again & trucked them to my welder along with fittings I got at the plumbing supply house. Went back & got them when he finished. Charged a couple hundred. Couple hints - make sure you don't get cast fittings (I thought I got good ones but accidentally ended up with a couple cast ones that caused problems later - try using 12" black iron nipples cut in half), and don't get any more fittings put on than necessary. See what they come with & make use of those best you can & go from there. You can see in my pics, but I didn't get any stacking brackets welded on - I just used some 6x & 4x lumber. Was easier for me to do that. Some have stacked on pallet racking too. If you can get them home & in place, you could get them welded together while they're at the shop, but they're a lot harder to move around after that. Even stacking my 330s was a bit tricky, things are heavy and like to roll around.

And another hint - don't bother painting them. I did that, and they sure looked sexy after, but did they ever stink the house up after I got heat in them. I did use cheap paint though...
Click to expand...



Thanks again Maple1, Always great insight.
 
I drop this picture to point out the things I'd do different if you intend to go vertical. Overall this is working excellent. 10' ceilings and two 500 gal tanks. You may not have this much height, but if you can go vertical I can explain how I did the top and bottom ports to minimize height (PM or ask here). We welded 6-8" nipples to the tank so all threaded fittings are outside the insulation. Leak check all welds because some pin holes are probable before foaming. If I did it again I'd move the house supply and return manifolds further towards the top and bottom 8-10" to take better advantage of the hotter stored water on top. But this works just fine.

We welded four vertical angles to each tank for legs. If interested I can provide the necessary steel angle, weld length, and fillet size to make sure it is safe. Of everything here, the structural integrity of the legs is the biggest safety issue. Don't trivialize approximately ~6,000 lbs/tank you and your family will be hanging around. The tanks are the only thing in our system that could kill someone.

We did roll paint the tank with a primer just to provide a good surface for the foam. May have been unnecessary but didn't want any regrets.

We welded temporary 3" angles out both sides of each tank a little above half way up before they were foamed. They stuck out of the insulation about 5-6". The angles provided lift points for the fork lift tines to pick them up, rotate them to vertical, and maneuver the tanks into the barn and be placed. Placing them was not trivial and using a fork lift was invaluable. After tanks were placed we cut off the handling angles. There was three of us including the guy on the fork lift to place them. Not trivial.

I can provide more details if you decide vertical.

Best wishes


IMG_1559.JPG
 
I rented a u haul box truck to haul mine home, set them on some rough sawn 8x8s so I could roll them back and forth, cut holes where I wanted them, flushed them out with a power washer, bought some "thread o let" fittings from a local Webbs, a local welder who specializes in snow making pipe welding came and welded them on site, I then painted them, probably unnecessarily, a neighbor with a back hoe helped me stuff them in through the bulkhead door, fortunately I have a 40" door, then I used a engine crane and some various gymnastics to stack them, not something I'd want to do again. I used reinforced 6x6s to stack them. I'm close enough to Tarm that they did the piping/install, very nice job. In retrospect I could have done it myself but would have taken a lot longer.
 
NE Poultry Supply said:
Any lessons already learned?

I found a source or decommissioned propane tanks. Had to call all over New England but I got them.

I think I will be stacking them (2 500s for 1000 gal storage).

What is the best way to go about it-
Transporting?
Preperation (How much should I expect to pay a welder? to add the valves and staking brackets)?
Moving it into place (how many people to move 900# tanks?
Click to expand...


Where are you in Southern Maine?

I charge $40/hr for welding, and I am cheap (for welding services) in this area...

In this instance... hydraulics are your friend.
 
NE Poultry Supply said:
Hole saw or torch?
Click to expand...
Ask the welder. If I was welding it up I would prefer a hole saw be used. A hole saw will give you a cleaner base metal and a better fit up.

However if you have steady hand and .re really comfortable with a oxy fuel torch have at it.

Another thought, will the metal that gets into the tank from the cutting be accessible to clean out. I can imagine metal shaving or bb's and pumps don't get along very well.
 
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Run your distribution pipe into your tank and weld the end shut. Then drill or plasma holes along the horizontal length of your pipe. This will allow for better stratification being the water isn't jetted to the other end of tank. Read John Siegenthaler's article If I made The tanks part 1. for this and more good advice on tanks.
 
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plumedic said:
Run your distribution pipe into your tank and weld the end shut. Then drill or plasma holes along the horizontal length of your pipe. This will allow for better stratification being the water isn't jetted to the other end of tank. Read John Siegenthaler's article If I made The tanks part 1. for this and more good advice on tanks.
Click to expand...

I haven't had much of a problem with good stratification with not doing something like that. Couple factors that could help make that a non-issue, is the distribution system running at low flow levels (making sure you've got lots of radiation and it's laid out right so you don't need lots of flow - or even better use in-floor or panel or cast iron rads that don't need water as hot), and when batch burning time your burns so that they are happening at times of peak heat demand. I do that, and the end result is that most of the time when I'm burning, half the flow (more or less) out the boiler is going thru my zones as opposed to storage, making for very little chance of mixing in storage. Helps on the other side too, when just heating off storage - slow flow = less mixing. Also, not burning until your storage is fully depleted will also help maintain stratification, with the lump of cooler water being on the bottom and the flow into storage also being reduced by the fact that a good part of the flow out of the boiler is being diverted around the bypass to maintain 140 into the boiler. Then another effect of starting with fully depleted storage is that the longer the water going into the bottom of the boiler is at minimum temp (140), the more heat the exchanger/tubes in the boiler will pull out of the exhaust stream over the course of a burn = a bit better efficiency.
 
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I'd recommend painting SCRAP and EMPTY on the side of the tanks. Got a lot of funny looks during transport.

JP
 
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Bought my 1000 gal LP from local gas company. It delivered the tank for free. Hired local welder to weld in 1-1/2" fittings, used a hole saw and an arc welder. He said I did not need to pressure test, I asked why, and he said he welds 3000+ psi pipes at the local nuke plant. His welds were works of art. Obviously, no leaks.

The fittings were in the rounded end of the tank, one horizontal injection about 6" from the top with an 18" extension into the tank to "shoot" hot water to the opposite end of the 18' long tank. The other same end about 6" up from the bottom, no extension. Stratification is extreme, flow rate about 14gpm.
 
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I'm not wanting to pass judgment on the welder who did your work, but I'm also a certified welder and I'm pretty damn proud of my work too but sometimes you have leaks. I would check them if it was me.
 
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I understand your point of view on testing a weld. This will be the start of the 9th heating system with the boiler. My pressures are less than 1/100th of the pressure handled by the pipes my welder works on. I trusted his advice, and the trust has been born out by time.
 
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