I never knew diesels were such a pain

[orca]

Just a quick google search came up with this....VERIFY: Should You Fill Your Gas Tank With A Tanker Truck Present? | wfmynews2.com

[Big Rick]

Starbrite Startron tank cleaner!

[sandsys]

3 hours ago, orca said:

Just a quick google search came up with this....VERIFY: Should You Fill Your Gas Tank With A Tanker Truck Present? | wfmynews2.com

So their answer is yes the tanker stirs up sediment but that's not a problem?

Linda

[Barbaraok]

Have been through many truck stops where I've seen all the trucks stop filling as the guy starts pumping the diesel.   Lore, maybe.  Should all the filters take care of it, yes, but depending on time of year, how much rain they've had, how careful they are, etc., I just get in line and sit and wait until the trucks in front have decided it is ok and let them fuel up, then I'll fuel up.   If the truck stop is big enough, they don't pump out of the tank filled that day, but let it sit and switch to that one the next day or two.  

[Jaydrvr]

56 minutes ago, Barbaraok said:

Have been through many truck stops where I've seen all the trucks stop filling as the guy starts pumping the diesel.   Lore, maybe.  Should all the filters take care of it, yes, but depending on time of year, how much rain they've had, how careful they are, etc., I just get in line and sit and wait until the trucks in front have decided it is ok and let them fuel up, then I'll fuel up.   If the truck stop is big enough, they don't pump out of the tank filled that day, but let it sit and switch to that one the next day or two.  

I've pumped maybe....200,000 gallons (just an educated guess) of diesel over the years, mostly at highway truck stops, often with tankers dropping their load. I can't remember ever seeing anyone stopping to wait for that. Had they done that, there would be unhappy drivers behind them impatiently demanding they move along. The busier fuel stops are dropping fuel almost continually, in order to keep up with demand. Only one time can I remember thinking I had a fuel problem, but it turned out to be an electrical issue. The sheer quantity of fuel being pumped tends to insure a fresh and clean supply. Jay

[hemsteadc]

39 minutes ago, Jaydrvr said:

 The sheer quantity of fuel being pumped tends to insure a fresh and clean supply. Jay

Yes  it does, but that also may mean a long, crowded wait at a Flying J or eq.  I will pay a bit more at a less busy place just for the convenience, and so far, no bad fuel.

The biggest pain  I have with my 2008 MDT Cummins 8.3L is the DPF( diesel particulate filter).  I can't do much bareback city driving or I'll start getting that  low growling engine noise followed by the DPF full light.  I'm not sure if my engine is regenerating properly or what.  I've tried the manual switch to force it, but that didn't work, but there's this weird slider on the button that I didn't see at first so maybe that's the trick.

Anyway, for now, since I don't tow a vehicle I am forced to rent one for stays much longer than a week. It's expensive, which isn't a problem, it's finding a vehicle rental place and a taxi to get me there.

Edited December 19, 2020 by hemsteadc

[Kirk W]

17 hours ago, Jaydrvr said:

The sheer quantity of fuel being pumped tends to insure a fresh and clean supply.

Love's has two truck stops just across the street from each other at exit 540 on I-20, Van, TX. I have a friend who drives a fuel tanker for them and drives a truck stationed there. Those two truck stops use enough fuel that they keep 3 tank trucks stationed there, each one operating for 2 shifts of 10 hr. per day, 7 days per week. According to my friend, they haul more than 80% of their loads to one of those two stations, with the number of loads per shift of  3 and sometimes 4. He also said that each stations pumps about 1 load of gasoline (all 3 octaines combined) and the remainder is diesel. Their trucks tanks are split into 4 tanks so can carry 4 types of fuel at one time. With about 18 loads per day split between 2 stations, there would be a lot of waiting around if no truck were to fill while fuel is being unloaded. He also tells me that most large travel centers have similar volume of sales. 

Edited December 20, 2020 by Kirk W

[podwerkz]

Diesel pumps have one or two inline fuel filters so those should catch any floating debris, and the pickup tubes in the underground tanks are above the bottom, so they don't normally suck up much debris. 

Unless someone went to a lot of trouble to bypass the filters (virtually no chance of that) you should be getting clean fuel even if a tanker is offloading fuel.

 

 

[rickeieio]

22 hours ago, Rich&Sylvia said:

And then why have fuel filters in vehicles?

 

Because filters at fuel stations are glorified "strainers".  If they used finer filters, the pumps would soon be really slow.

When I was a lad playing with the dinosaur puppies, vehicle fuel filters were rated at perhaps 25 microns.  Today's diesels require 2 micron filters.  Wanna spend real money?  Replace the filters on a newer John Deere harvester at over $100 for the kit, 10 micron pre-filter and 2 micron secondary. You might get a whole season before you need to replace them again.  But then, they're filtering a good bit of fuel, near 250 gal./day.

[Big Rick]

13 hours ago, Kirk W said:

Love's has two truck stops just across the street from each other at exit 540 on I-20, Van, TX. I have a friend who drives a fuel tanker for them and drives a truck stationed there. Those two truck stops use enough fuel that they keep 3 tank trucks stationed there, each one operating for 2 shifts of 10 per day, 7 days per week. According to my friend, they haul more than 80% of their loads to one of those two stations, with the number of loads per shift of  3 and sometimes 4. He also said that each stations pumps about 1 load of gasoline (all 3 octaines combined) and the remainder is diesel. Their trucks tanks are split into 4 tanks so can carry 4 types of fuel at one time. With about 18 loads per day split between 2 stations, there would be a lot of waiting around if no truck were to fill while fuel is being unloaded. He also tells me that most large travel centers have similar volume of sales. 

While the trucks may have 4 compartments they do not deliver 4 grades of fuel.

 

unleaded and Super unleaded are combined at the pump to create the mid grade of gasoline fuel.

I have worked many fuel related insurance claims and this is how the stations do the fuel. 

[Kirk W]

44 minutes ago, Big Rick said:

While the trucks may have 4 compartments they do not deliver 4 grades of fuel.

 

14 hours ago, Kirk W said:

Their trucks tanks are split into 4 tanks so can carry 4 types of fuel at one time........

He also said that each stations pumps about 1 load of gasoline (all 3 octaines combined) and the remainder is diesel.

How does that disagree with what you "know" to be true? They can but nowhere does it say that they do  ☺️ The other thing that I found interesting when I toured the refill station for the tankers is that you can't tell what the truck is unloading as they have 1 unloading area and hoses for each type of fuel there so the driver just connects the proper hose for what he is unloading. At times he might be unloading both gasoline and diesel. The Love's drivers usually load however much gasoline the trip requires and then fill any unused tank sections with diesel, since they pump so much of it. 

EDIT:  Just as an afterthought, I wonder if there isn't an occasional driver who puts a load into the wrong tank at a station?

Edited December 20, 2020 by Kirk W

[Big Rick]

47 minutes ago, Kirk W said:

 

How does that disagree with what you "know" to be true? They can but nowhere does it say that they do  ☺️ The other thing that I found interesting when I toured the refill station for the tankers is that you can't tell what the truck is unloading as they have 1 unloading area and hoses for each type of fuel there so the driver just connects the proper hose for what he is unloading. At times he might be unloading both gasoline and diesel. The Love's drivers usually load however much gasoline the trip requires and then fill any unused tank sections with diesel, since they pump so much of it. 

EDIT:  Just as an afterthought, I wonder if there isn't an occasional driver who puts a load into the wrong tank at a station?

Exactly why I have insurance claims on them!

[justRich]

It was on NPR radio's "Car Talk" with "Click & Clack the Tappet Brothers" that they mentioned station re-fueling contamination.  (My memory only takes a day or two to kick in.)
Their claim was that the delivery tanker trucks fuel tanks are as dirty as any private vehicle fuel tank.
Which is why when a fuel tanker delivers fuel to a station, there can be more debris in solution than normal.

Tom & Ray Magliozzi seemed like pretty smart guys with a lot of experience and their own Car Talk radio show on NPR.

[sandsys]

Click and Clack are the ones who taught me how to set the outside mirrors on my van so I had no blind spots. Very knowledgeable and helpful people.

Linda

[Barbaraok]

All I know is that I have been at a Pilot when NOT one truck was pumping while the tanker was filling a tank.   We were in line and everyone was standing around.   Took about 10 minutes and then everyone started pumping again and soon we moved up and could fuel up.  

BTW, to tell what a tanker is carrying, look at the red placard on the truck.   If the number is 1203, it is gasoline, if it is 1202 (or 1993) it is diesel.  And don't ask why there are 2 possible numbers for diesel.  

[Jaydrvr]

28 minutes ago, Barbaraok said:

All I know is that I have been at a Pilot when NOT one truck was pumping while the tanker was filling a tank.   We were in line and everyone was standing around.   Took about 10 minutes and then everyone started pumping again and soon we moved up and could fuel up.  

BTW, to tell what a tanker is carrying, look at the red placard on the truck.   If the number is 1203, it is gasoline, if it is 1202 (or 1993) it is diesel.  And don't ask why there are 2 possible numbers for diesel.  

Did you ask WHY no-one was pumping? Sounds like a computer reset to me. When the pumps won't activate because the computer won't let them, the only fix is a computer reset. During that process, no-one pumps because the pumps aren't working. That's the only time I've ever been at a fuel stop when not a single pump was in use. Jay

[Star Dreamer]

Sounds like we are one of the few that had diesel fuel issues but mainly it was due to the design of the trucks fueling system. We had a 2003 Chevy Duramax pickup and it's fuel system was designed before the 2007 fuel change. The newer fuel wreck havoc with the fuel injectors such that we went through about 21 injectors (8 were replaced under warranty). The fuel system filters would not catch the crap that was in the fuel and the high fuel pressure and the crap destroyed the injectors. We finally had to pump all our fuel into an auxiliary tank and then use a dual filter system to pump into the trucks tank. This helped to extend the life of the injectors but we got rid of the truck at around 240k miles after putting on about 70k miles ourselves.

That experience did not stop us from going to another diesel with our HDT. We regularly change fuel filters with each oil change and carry a spare filter with us. We have a Davco fuel filter system do we can see as the filter is getting close to needing to be replaced.  We have put over 100k miles on our HDT (has 540k on the odometer) without any fuel issues, although we did have the fuel gell up on us one winter and had the replace the fuel filter before we started using the truck in the Spring. 

[GlennWest]

49 minutes ago, Star Dreamer said:

Sounds like we are one of the few that had diesel fuel issues but mainly it was due to the design of the trucks fueling system. We had a 2003 Chevy Duramax pickup and it's fuel system was designed before the 2007 fuel change. The newer fuel wreck havoc with the fuel injectors such that we went through about 21 injectors (8 were replaced under warranty). The fuel system filters would not catch the crap that was in the fuel and the high fuel pressure and the crap destroyed the injectors. We finally had to pump all our fuel into an auxiliary tank and then use a dual filter system to pump into the trucks tank. This helped to extend the life of the injectors but we got rid of the truck at around 240k miles after putting on about 70k miles ourselves.

That experience did not stop us from going to another diesel with our HDT. We regularly change fuel filters with each oil change and carry a spare filter with us. We have a Davco fuel filter system do we can see as the filter is getting close to needing to be replaced.  We have put over 100k miles on our HDT (has 540k on the odometer) without any fuel issues, although we did have the fuel gell up on us one winter and had the replace the fuel filter before we started using the truck in the Spring. 

Yes, and Chevy stood behind those injectors too. They knew they were faulty and put a lifetime warranty on them. I had a 2005. Loved that truck. Just regular maintenance. Traded it at 250k and that was a mistake. Tht 2012 was a big disappointment. 

[Kirk W]

11 hours ago, Barbaraok said:

Took about 10 minutes and then everyone started pumping again and soon we moved up and could fuel up.  

Only 10 minutes for a truck to pump in 5000+ gallons of fuel and the sediment to settle out? At the Love's that I described, on one side the truck unloading station can be seen from the gas pumps but not the truck side and the other you can't see the unloading station from any of the pumps. In addition, it isn't unusual for the truck to sit at the unloading dock after it has emptied, while the driver goes inside, uses the restroom, gets a meal and whatever he does between loads. 

[sandsys]

17 hours ago, Jaydrvr said:

Did you ask WHY no-one was pumping? Sounds like a computer reset to me. When the pumps won't activate because the computer won't let them, the only fix is a computer reset. During that process, no-one pumps because the pumps aren't working. That's the only time I've ever been at a fuel stop when not a single pump was in use. Jay

I wonder if that's when they reset prices based on what's being delivered?

Linda

[Jaydrvr]

56 minutes ago, sandsys said:

I wonder if that's when they reset prices based on what's being delivered?

Linda

No, they reset prices on the fly -- as long as the computer isn't on the fritz.. Jay

[JimK]

The diesel is pumped from bottom of the tank.  That is where all the sediment settles.  Perhaps you would get less sediment if you pumped when a tanker was emptying and stirring the sediment.

[Darryl&Rita]

11 minutes ago, JimK said:

The diesel is pumped from bottom of the tank.  That is where all the sediment settles.  Perhaps you would get less sediment if you pumped when a tanker was emptying and stirring the sediment.

The fuel is not pumped from the bottom, just as it isn't in your vehicle tank. Near, but not off the bottom.

[Ray,IN]

On 12/19/2020 at 7:44 AM, rickeieio said:

Yes it is.  Both my hdt's are diesel.  And my last 12 pickups have been gasoline.  I don't pull or haul a lot with my pickups, just me and my tool box, perhaps a passenger or three.   I don't work a pickup hard enough to ever reap any benefit of paying up for a diesel. YMMV.

My point it, diesels MAY have more peak torque, but at a price, and for most of us they simply don't pay.

Are there gasoline powered trucks that could pull our rv?  Sure, for a while.  But they're in smaller trucks which won't safely handle it going through mountains or in the event of a brake malfunction.  Thus my choice to buy a bigger truck.

When Ford announced the all new 7.3L pushrod V-8 the ball-game changed dramatically. Ford uses the new V-8 in trucks from the F250 to F750, including vans.

IMO it will gain popularity with the towing crowd.

 

Edited January 24, 2021 by Ray,IN

[duraduk]

On 12/21/2020 at 9:58 PM, GlennWest said:

Yes, and Chevy stood behind those injectors too. They knew they were faulty and put a lifetime warranty on them. I had a 2005. Loved that truck. Just regular maintenance. Traded it at 250k and that was a mistake. Tht 2012 was a big disappointment. 

You were fortunate.  I had a 2003 Duramax and they replaced the first set at 70,000 miles,  paid for half of the second set at 110000 and refused to pay for the third set and 145000.  I had extra filtration and always bought fuel at high volume stations.  The injectors were faulty by design.  Sold the truck in 2012 and bought a Ram.  No problems with it.