Add fuel sender

[Mystiko]

Want to add a fuel sender to a an aluminum diesel fuel tank. Is it ok just to drill into it with a hole saw when there is diesel fuel in the tank, taking care to vacuum up the cuttings as it is being cut with a shop vac so little falls into the tank? Is this safe or will the battery drill motor spark/s or heat from the friction of the drill be unsafe?

Thanks, and happy holidays.

 

[Tim R.]

I drilled into mine just fine. I used hand snips to cut the hole though. As long as you are cutting, add an inspection port so you can clean out the shavings this time and keep the tank clean in the future.

If you are worried put some dry ice in the tank. The CO2 will fill the tank and sparks will be no problem.

 

[Steve Dion]

Suprised that your tank does NOT have a manual gauge. If you want an electric unit, check out WEMA.

 

[Stu Jackson]

You can save some $$ by simply calculating your fuel use. Our sender broke in 1492 and since they keep breaking, I'll wait until they rip the boat outta my dying hands before I'll bother replacing the sender. 0.493 gallons per hour on a 1986 21 hp M-25 3 cylinder. Carefully tracked over 12 years on a simple spreadsheet. Say it's half a gallon an hour, every 20 hours it needs 10 gallons in a 23 gallong tank. Simple.