water heated fuel tank

[greg_a_morton]

guys I am trying to figure out how I want to do my heated tank for my mercury. I plan on trying to use 25% wmo and 75% diesel. I would like to use more but my 4bt seems to not like it like the idi. Hopefully with the heated tank I could go more oil with a good additive. I have a nice 24" round tank that's about 27" long that would look sharp on my bed. My question is that all the tanks that I see being built are aluminum and mine is steel. It seems to me that if aluminum transmits heat fast it could loose heat fast during the winter. If that is right will the steel hold in heat longer? I am going to sandblast and paint mine in black and then wrap center section with stainless steel for the bling that my truck seems to like. Just wandering about any of yalls heated tanks and pics would be awesome.

 

[gearhead]

just run a couple pieces of copper tubing through the tank, parallel to the bottom.Or near your pickup. Loop the things together until you are left with 2 lines coming in/out of the tank.Then connect those to your water lines from the engine..

 

[greg_a_morton]

how much line will need to be in there to get maximum heat transfer? I would like to get the tank to about 100degrees and have a small inline heater under the hood to get it to about 150degrees. I bought me a 125 gallon or so stainless pot to day to start doing my filtering setup!!

 

[gearhead]

assuming the tank will be mounted so that the 27 is the length(across the width of the bed) just run two tubes across the bottom.should be plenty.

then I would use tubes to carry the water back to the tank.Maybe include some rubber sections so that the frame/body movement doesn't break the tubing..

so maybe 66 in of tubing for the tank,then some 90' bends or what not,then i dunno 15 ft of tube from engine to tank?depending on length.

 

[dealwithit]

a nice bit of extra coolant capacity too