Calibration of New Oil Tank

Some other good information to know would be:

Your locale (how else would one guess the local statutory requirements, if any?)

The diameter of the tank.

The shape of the bottom of the tank (flat, torispherical, semi-elliptical, etc.)

What the ladder does is completely irrelevant.

I would guess that a key requirement is that the palm oil does not overflow the top of the tank.

The bottom is flat.It is in India.

Dear friend,

Since you and the oil tank are in India, its ok. Why and who are you afraid of in India? Anyone and anything runs smooth in India. Remember to save your oil and money and take our leaders as examples for your progress in life. They earn from anything such as wages and food for poors, lunch for school children, cricket and even on import of coffins for soldiers.

Please listen to IPL hot news on contrives, connivances, settings and collaborations by Mr Lalit Modi (IPL Commissioner) and Mr Shashi Tharoor (Minister of State for External Affairs). Mr Tharoor's lady something, the daughter of a retired Army Colonel (moderately paid government servant), had been employed in private job for some years and has invested 70 crore INR (14 million Dollars) in IPL. There are no limits.

See any time any channel in India.

Anything is possible in India. Inspectors are not any better ones. Relax.

Regards.

Aside from the shape of the tank and what it contains, what kind of gauging are you using? A dip stick? A float gauge with a dial readout? In either case it is a simple mater of calculating the volume at the various levels and translating that to your gauge.

Dip sticks are easy and cheap. It the tank has any symmetry, the tank manufacturer can tell you the quanity. There are many level indicators on the market.

PEbob

Hai dear,

First point is to know shape of the tank in order to calculate volume.

Also to calculate volume you must know the density of oil to be stored in order to have exact volume.

Suppose you have circular vertical tank, you must calculate volume of tank considering the density of oil stored. Divide voloume by the height of tank. Example : A tank volume comes 1000 ltr and tank height is 10mtr, you have calibration 100 ltr per mtr.

To be safer side you must take only 85 ~ 90 percent of tank as you need to leave some buffer for vapour etc.

i hope i could answer your question.

Thanks to all for their comments and suggestions.

If the tank is empty and lets say it is a 20,000 gallon tank.It would be 18,000 gallons that is 90% plenty of room for expansion. Any tank as a matter of rule should only be filled to 90%. I cannot believe they did not give you a chart book with the inches on one side coinciding gallons on the other. Also a stick to measure the hight of the product at different levels.By putting it in thru the hole on the top of tank.You should have a Derrick of some kind to control any spillage from rupture or over filling the tank.Consisting of a wall cement 4ft. high or some kind of containment area of similar design. Good luck geitae

Hello vkturki,

To calculate the volume of the tank, you do not need to know the density of the oil. The amount of orange juice or coconut oil in a 38.181818181818 centimeters ling, 10 centimeters dia cylindrical container when full, will be 3 liters.

I do not believe that oil will vapourise if stored in ambient temperature. Leave an ounce of oil in an open container in the sun for a few days, say 10 days and see if the level is reduced. If at all, will be due the vapourisation of the water content in the oil will be the reason for the reduction of level.

Job Thykkoottathil

Hai dear,

May be i am wrong. But waht i understand is as below.

Reason Why i asked to consider density is as :

1)

I never knew what unit he want to use to calibrate tank.

Unit used for Furnace oil in India is M Ton .

LSHS, LDO also comes in same Unit.

So a liter of water can not be equal to 1 liter of F.o when unit weight is considered.

If u consider the density it is very preciese and can be used for any unit of measurement (litre or ton)

2

As a standard design practice one must leave some portion as a buffer (depends 5~10 %). This buffer include the overflow line and the so called vapor. These vapor or air gap are not only due ambient temperature. During refilling tank,there must be some space left for the air to pass which will go upwards due to refilling.

Hello Guest,

How long is your dip-stick? 22 feet? I imagine that it will be very difficult to climb all the way to the top and use a 22' long dip-stick to measure the level? To make your life easier, why cant you attach a transparent plastic tube from the bottom of the tank and attach it vertically, all the way to the top, on the outside of the tank as a sight glass? You can attach this tube on a graduated metal of wooden piece to help you determine the volume of oil in the tank. Please remember not to close the top end of the tube.

Job Thykkoottathil.

Dear Zodiac,

So many people use this transparent tube for level monitoring.

But there is a problem with these tubes. They turn hasy over a period of time due to exposure to sun.

What i used for such things a float tied to metalic wire (1/16 ) and a external graduation scale. This scale number 0,1,2 etc from the top. When tank is full out side scale indicator will be at the bottom of this sacle. on empty, the scale indicator will be at the top of this scale.

But you need to be sure to use right float for right liquid.

You can think something like below shown idea.

Full procedure can be found in API MPMS Chapter 2. (Manual of Petroleum Measurement Standard.

At some stage you need to convert your level measurement into a volume. For this you need to have tank tables which are developed from the methods shown in the API above.

Tanks are strapped (outside circumference measurement) at regular intervals and tables developed to convert a level reading to a volume. In developing these tables there are many possible errors which come from such things as strapping tape calibration, temperature compensation (for tape & tank), tension of tape, correction for shell plate thickness, tank bottom movement, shell deformation (bulging) due to liquid head etc etc..

To measure level there are two methods using gauge tapes and bobs, they are "innage and "outage" (dip or ullage). One (dip or innage) you measure from the bottom of the tank to the liquid level and the other you measure from a reference point at the top of the tank to the liquid level.

Remember that the tank will "breathe" with changes in temperature, Boss, as will the volume of its contents. So the level will change a little, even when nothing is added to or taken out of the tank.

In India till now only Strapping method is authorised by weights & measure. In Strapping method we have to take circumference of tank at different heights or length in case of Horizontal Tanks. we are doing this kind of work since last 50 years, if you want our services you can contact us at caligauge at rediffmail dot com) caligauge@rediffmail.com Sanjay