Fuel tank capacity

Seastoke

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Ht all fuel tanks are full of diesel,and i need to know how much tanks holds,to plan pasages, easy to work out in a car just fill up when light comes on not so easy on boat can you help.r
 
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99% of all boat tanks are stamped with capacity and pressure test.

A plate normally on the top , try a mirror to see.


Also a measurement is a good idea, bear in mind that all tanks have a fuel pickup line above the tank bottom or they would pick up water so volume less say 5%.
 
Cubic Feet



A cubic measurement is the three-dimensional derivative of a linear measure, so a cubic foot is defined as the volume of a cube with sides 1 ft in length.

In metric terms a cubic foot is a cube with sides 0.3048 metres in length. One cubic foot is the equivalent to approximately 0.02831685 cubic metres, or 28.3169 litres.

More information >>






In old money 1 ft³ = 6.2288 imperial gallons

or in mew money one cubic metre = 1,000 litres.
 
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Hmm, this won't be very accurate if the tanks are tapered/flared in any direction.

Or large cross section, or if the boat moves a bit, if the tank were say 1m long by 500mm wide which is quite small for a large engined mobo then the level difference adding 2l would be 4mm which would be almost impossible to accurately measure with a dipstick on a moving platform and certainly not reliable enough for something as important as on board fuel calculation. Possibly OK for a small auxiliary tank on a yacht to give an idea.
 
A dip stick which is calibrated ie put in 20 litres of fuel mark it then another 20 litres and mark it and so forth is more accurate than any electronic tank senders seem to be.
 
What's going on? Why are peeps suddenly yacking on about gallons and cubic feet? Is there some strange backwater somewhere still peddling juice in gallons? Come on folks, it's 2013.
 
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