At sea Fuel transfer.

[ATGEP]

A funny thing happened on the return leg of shrimping today.  A mile south of SJ island a becalmed sailboat waived for help. We stopped and they informed us they were out of wind and out of gas!.  I was comfortable enough with my reserve to offer 5 Gal but had to figure out how to get it out of my main tank which was now at 20 gal and about level with the floor.  The sailboater took apart his fuel line and arranged components to allow us to use the primer bulb to fill his tank 1 squeeze at a time. He was 16 miles from Friday harbor and filled up with my gas and motored on his way. I got back to anacortes with 10 gallons of reserve and a new 20$ bill. The only reason this worked was the perfect weather conditions and took about 45 min to move 5 gal.

Does anyone carry a fuel transfer pump or a spare can for special needs that may arise?

[Salmon King]

Well done sir!

You have earned MAJOR karma points!!

[Markshoreline]

Some friends came up to visit us at West Beach Resort many years ago when I had a 16 Tiderunner.  As the evening progressed, he and I decided to circumnavigate Orcas as the sun was setting.  The water got rough and we slopped through but ran out of gas just a mile from the resort.  Fortunately I had a 3 gallon can for the Evinrude kicker.  Unfortunately we had no such device as you are mentioning.  So we "free poured" from the 3 gallon into the fuel filler in the darkness and rough water. We got enough in there to make it back to the cabin...
I didn't think of pulling the kicker fuel line and removing the connector to transfer with the bulb.  Duh!
Good point about having a way to transfer fuel without causing a major spill!

[SookeFirefighter]

I have portable tanks on my boat for kicker/main so somewhat limited on gas.   Partially because of this I always have a full tank in cuddy (5 gal) and sometimes another small spare as well.    Give some extra weight up front and mostly absolute peace of mind for me  (where I fish, a gallon or 5 l would get me home).

[Peddler]

Kudos to you for rendering assistance. There ARE still good folks out there!

I've carried spare fuel containers in the past on boats with smaller capacity, but not on the current boat. 

I couldn't siphon from the main tanks. My only option would be to remove the quick-connect fitting from the line going to my kicker, and pump the bulb just as you did.  I do have a couple of funnels on-board, which should help avoid the problem Mark had years-ago. 


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[Tunacious]

I recently had a problem with my water separator filter.  I replaced it twice in two days.

Lucky I had one on board.  It got me back to the port after changing it.

The second day I had the same problem and lucky again I had replaced my replacement and had one on board again.

When I purchased my next replacement I bought three of them.  One for the one that needed to be put back on the boat, one for the replacement in the boat and one for my truck in case I had a problem again and couldn't get a replacement on the weekend.

I built myself a siphon with a bulb on it to siphon out the gas that was left in my boat to get rid of it.

My siphon is not stored on my boat but I think I will put it there now.  It doesn't take up much room.

[First Cabin]

I keep a spare tank with 6 gallons of fuel along with a new fuel line that plugs into it.  My thought is that if I run out of fuel or if my main fuel is contaminated for one reason or another, I can just plug this new fuel tank with fuel line directly the motor and be on my way.

Or I could just hand the entire thing over to another boater in distress.

[rclark4179]

This thing works great if the source is higher then the destination.


http://www.homedepot.com/p/American-Specialty-Wonder-Pump-6-ft-Siphon-Hose-6-PMP6HD/203635079

Transferred 5 gallons in about 4 minutes.

[Peddler]

This thing works great if the source is higher then the destination.


http://www.homedepot.com/p/American-Specialty-Wonder-Pump-6-ft-Siphon-Hose-6-PMP6HD/203635079

Transferred 5 gallons in about 4 minutes.

Those are neat, but the physics of a siphon wouldn't work in the scenario outlined in the original post.  You can not siphon from below-deck tank to an above deck receptacle.  You need a pump in such cases.

[Markshoreline]

I think they were pumping with the bulb and that's why it took so long!

[ATGEP]

yup we pumped the ball about a thousand times to pull 5 gallons up.  I am looking at something like this:  http://www.gastapper.com/store/p2/GasTapper_Pro_Model.html

It fits my desire to be prepped for everything.

[Yachter Yat]

   Atgep: 

   Thanks for that.  Nice little rig.  Looks like it would come in quite handy siphoning that old fuel from our tanks every spring. 

Yat

[Zarn]

Bravo.... Well Done.

I carry a hand operated transfer pump on board (harbor freight). It can be adapted to cordless drill I use for deep water bait checks. 

An alternative if you can get the supply tank up. Harbor Freight, "Gluggler Hose" inexpensive, buy two keep both on board. I cut one of the two I have to the appropriate length to service both the main and deck tanks. Place the supply tank above the receiver tank. Put the metal end in the supply tank and the other in the receiver tank. Shake the metal end until it self- siphons. It will empty a 5 gal jerry in approx  3-4 minutes. Zero spillage if done correctly. On my 17' arima if I am filling the main I place the supply tank on the sponson. If I am filling the deck tank (placed just forward of the port companion seat) I put the supply tank on the seat. I always have the supply tank in a plastic bag and a towel underneath it to stop it from sliding and catch any drips. I used to use a long funnel. That was not at all efficient.

[ATGEP]

I use the glugger type hose to fill up at home. This method requires gravity. In my case I needed to pull fuel from deck level up to a can. As I was not going to leave them adrift, I would have towed them to Fri Harbor which would have taken 2.5 hrs.  Much easier to "sell" them some gas. Other uses for a 12 pump solution would be sucking large amount of water from bottom of tank, Defueling tank for maintenance, ETC.