Well I learned something today that might come in handy when you buy a truck. On a whim, I bought a T/A Dump truck at a recent RB Auction. The truck is fine I am happy with the purchase. It came with 2 full fuel tanks. I was jacked about that as that is worth around $3.00 per gallon. I just happened to break off a soft plug on the bottom of one tank while unloading it. No biggie, I caught it early & got the leak stopped quickly before my 2 full tanks of RED DYE diesel was lost. Yep my over the road, ready to go back to work on Monday truck is full of red dye. I am glad I caught it before it hit the road. Our local truck / GVW guy is very active, so I know it will be pulled over put through the portable scales & checked out at least once every 6 months. I guess in the future I will double check them prior to sending them out...
that dye will show up future tanks for a while i'm sure you already know that. How bad are they about dipping tanks in your part?
we had water trucks that stayed on the fill 24 / 7... then one day there is super dot chasing the truck down the fill... Because he had crossed the road, a temporary access across the fill .. but it was still consider a road... I don't know the out come of the ticket.. other than the trucks were drained of off-road fuel... And GIANT labels put on the fuel tanks..
Around here if a truck has plates on it your subject to have the tanks dipped. If the truck is being used on a jobsite only remove the plates and you can run offroad fuel..... if its a site truck and has current plates its going to cost you. I know a hand full of contractors that operate this way and seem to have no problems.
Not sure I want to find out on the dip test, but I suppose if I do my job, take it out & run clean fuel for a while in it it should clear up... I hope. If not oh well I tried to to the right thing.
It clears up pretty quick just run your tanks down as far as you can before filling up again for the next few fill ups. You could always dump a gal of used oil in on the next fill up then your fuel will be black.
Document what you have now in your log book. Drain it and refill with clean fuel. along with millage and date that should be enough to keep you from been found guiltyin court. The officer will still ticket you because that is his job but the court should let you off. It is all a waist of time.
We had all our trucks dip tested at our yard several years ago. The inspector asked politely and I had no problem with it as we keep the fuel legal. Afterwords he came in the shop and talked for quite a while. He claimed that just draining and refilling would not eliminate the color for a long time and any trace would be a cause for citation. One of his favorite places to hit was the grain elevators at harvest time. He would arrive in the early morning before they opened and a dozen trucks would be lined up waiting. He got one big farm outfit with five trucks in a row all running dyed. It cost them a lot, plus they lost their bulk fuel permit to store off road fuel for some years. Not worth it but farmers are notorious for running dyed fuel in their rigs.
I will say this with tongue in cheek as i was not there when it happened, but a few years back a local trucker bought a truck at a RB auction. after the auction he got in to drive the truck home and was cited for red fuel. He had not checked the tank and apparently the burden of doing so even right after an auction is the resposibility of the new owner. a little check will go a long way me thinks. just my two cents sirs.
I stopped the DOT guy the other day told him what I found & he told me how to get rid of it. I figured I would rather him tell me what to do before I have a problem with him. I will keep a copy of the work order witht he truck for a while. We drained the tanks, cross over lines, changed the filters & started with fresh fuel. It should be better, but not 100 % I'm sure.