I just had an idea.

Foodstuffs can be canned to avoid spoilage and preserve the food for years. I'm thinking the metal #10 cans might be a pain in the arse to load and store, but mineral spirits, naptha, acetone, and a whole mess of other solvents can be canned in metal cans and lasts for years.  

Why not gasoline?

I need a volunteer to go to their local LDS store with a 5 gallon can of gas and ask them if they can can some of it.

Anyone? Anyone?

Could store it in metal cans:









http://bestcontainers.com/pails––-closures-closed-head-steel-pails.html

Click on pails and buckets ––> Open or Closed Head Steel




or
http://www.bestcontainers.com/utility-cans-f-style-oblong-cans.html
 

In before the giant fireball.

I'll play along, but I am wearing my FRCs when I read the updated post on how well this works out.

You're not as crazy as we think you are.  Or something like that.



Metal can, solid seal, Vacuum, profit.



Sure, it's not putting gas in a #10 can, but it is a form of canning


 

I knew someone would see my vision!

Hmmm... what about cleaned beer kegs, with a vacuum pulled on each?

Dude, I spit my oj on the monitor.

if you dont mind spending $70 give or take for 5 gal's look into SEF. i think its overpriced if you can still find E free fuel but it can be stored for a long time until its opened. the down side is its "off road use only" for some reason. once opened they say it stays viable for 2 years.

OK, getting seruous, what is the vapor pressure of gas at the max expected temp.

What is the pressure rating of a sealed #10 can.

What about moisture in the alcohol portion and will it corrode the can's metal?

Let's just say that if you pulled a vacuum on the can prior to sealing it, it wouldn't stay that way for long...

I have made several "Jerry Kegs"

They are awesome and will NEVER rust out!

coffee + shade ... I'll be on the porch


 

I'm there, too. In before the firball

The LDS cannery would not let you bring gas into the facility to can it, but most canneries have a manual canner they will rent out to LDS members to take home and can whatever they would like. I've done brown sugar, corn, dehydrated fried rice, powder sugar, and many other things that the LDS don't sell "in house".

If you want to store fuel for years store alcohol, gasoline will break down over time. Alcohol can be used as a fuel source in cars as an emergency or older cars with out plastic parts for the fuel. Remember the Beverly Hillbilly’s truck that ran on moonshine? The Germans were running most of there farm equipment on alcohol during World War II.

old propane tank no more that 95% full.

Are the insides of propane tanks painted? Coated with a sealer?

If so, how does it react to long-term gasoline exposure?

Gasogene, or gasification.  Probably one of your best fuel sources during sustained de-civilization periods.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas_generator

Uhm... Hey, guys?






 

FWIW, I have a couple of pint paint cans (new with lids from Home Depot) that have lamp oil in them in the shed.  No rutures yet after several years.

I keep a bunch of my gas in metal 1 gallon cans.  The original contents had a seriously high VOC content, just like gas does so i feel very confident on the can being able to hold the pressures.  they look just like the cans paint thinner comes in.  1 gallon cans are real easy to handle also, and the cans are rectangular so they store easy.

Thinking about this thread, I used to have an actual gas can with a spout that was just a rectangular solvent can.

White gas (coleman fuel) is Naptha, and comes in one-gallon screw top cans. I've seen similar
for kerosene as well. I don't see why you couldn't put unleaded + some stabil in a similar can.
Putting it in a #10 would be kind of silly, though I remember old-school quarts of oil coming
packaged that way.

I wouldn't want to store it inside a house, but it seems like it'd be a reasonably way to store
a small quantity (say up to 20 gallons) in a shed, etc. Past that I think you'd be better off
with 5 gallon containers or even a 55 gallon drum, though it's a heck of lot less portable.

Here:  I couldn't find the popcorn, so I brought coffee, beer, and smokes...  I don't wanna miss this either.

Well it would work for storing gas for at least a year I would imagine, but the reason I started this thread was the idea I had to stash away a tankful of gas - just one tankful - and forget about it until needed. Lets say you've exhausted all of your gas and there's no more to scrounge in your AO; at least having a reserve of stabilized fuel would get you where you needed to go.

All in all, this is leading me to start thinking in the direction that having a vehicle capable of running on diesel and used motor oil would be a helluva good solution to the gas storage problem.

Guys, if ebola or whatever happens in cans when the food in them get rancid or sompin and BULGES them out or blows the seals open, what do you think gas that has a vapor pressure of up to 10 psi will do to the cans when the temperature gets up there?

How many cans would it take, with all the failure points that might be 100's of weak links all told, to equal the capacity of one 5 gallon MFC that is easily rated to be sealed and withstand the vapor pressure of gasoline at elevated temps?

As far as all the Stabil superstiious nonsense, last evening I started a Briggs 5 HP engine that had been sitting since Spring 2007.

I added  maybe 2 quarts of fresh fuel to the little left in the tank, sprayed the air filter w/ starting fluid, and it started right up.

That's sitting there for lesssee, 5 danged YEARS, w/ the old fuel that it initally ran on still in the danged bowl!

It immediately settled down and I could control the speed and make it purr at idle or rev up smoothly.

Starting fluid is often your friend, not mystery oils.

So, if you seal your fuel in rated MFC's that DON'T LEAK THE IMPORTANT FUEL FRACTIONS [that's a kind of low temp distillation] you should be good to go for many years.

Save your devalued cash and put in a few oz of mineral spirits/Stoddard solvent if adding something to your fuel satisfies whatever need there is to feel better abt it, because it isn't gonna make any differnce when the time comes to use it.

Investing a few minutes looking up 'vapor pressure' physics on Wiki and learning sompin instead of modeling cammo in front of the mirror, might be a good idea for 90% of the folks here.

Yes.

If you try to vacuum-seal gasoline you'll just boil-off the gasoline to replace the air you've removed. The final gasoline vapor pressure in the bottle or can will only depend on the temperature at which it is stored once it reaches equilibrium.

If you try to can gasoline in a heated bath, you'll end up generating lots of gasoline vapor, creating the potential for one hell of a fire or explosion.

If you store ethanol-free gasoline in good quality cans with intact gaskets and some decent storage treatment it will store just fine for a reasonable period of time. I store ethanol-free gasoline treated with Pri-G for one year then rotate it. It works fine to power my chainsaw, generator, or vehicles.

As far as vacuum packing gasoline for heaven's sake, I wish someone would post pix trying.

I'm of a different opinion on starting fluid. I never use it on engines. If my engine won't start without it I figure there is a mechanical or electrical problem I need to attend to first. I've seen a lot of old tractors 'addicted' to ether. Some folks claim that use of ether damages rings. I don't know that I believe that, but I do believe ether is sometimes used as a crutch to compensate for a lack of maintenance. I figure that ether-dependency of starting means your engine is just one step away from failing to start period.

Could be pretty entertaining.

How about somebody putting some Mason jars of gasoline in an open water bath canner on an open fire and filming the action from far away?

I can't imagine an engine addicted to anything. [But understand what your getting at.   ]

I can understand a LAZY OPERATOR failing to properly maintain the various engine systems and relying on a crutch to often get his engine started, same as folks depending on drugs, booze, food, caffine, nicotine, teevee, ect, to get their life running, if only temporarily.

In any case, last night the starter fluid simply made short work of the alternative of a lot of rope pulling I tried first. It's an IMPORTANT TOOL to have in the box.

Also, if the needle/float assembly was stuck, the aggressive vibrations of the engine running a few seconds will likely shake it loose as I think happened in my example.

The technique worked nicely, last night. If it hadn't, I'd have gone to plan 2, which for most folks is a trip to the small engine shop to lighten their wallet and become even more dependent than they already are.

I've been using an old 250 gal propane tank converted to hold gasoline for a year and a half now.  Sealed tight with no problems.  Painted white in full sunlight the pressure builds to no greater usually than about 10-12 psi.  Usually stays much less.  Considering these tanks are rated at 250 psi I've never worried that the gasoline could ever be a problem.  However, gasoline does have some funny properties under these conditions.  Normally I use a little added propane vapor pressure to charge the tank (5 psi) and deliver my gasoline but in the late afternoon that's not always necessary due to the natural pressure built up from the ambient temps.  But sometimes under these conditions when the tempreature of the gasoline itself has risen enough (to 70 deg ?) when it is released out of the nozzle the volatiles are more excited and are trying to escape the liquid at a rate that causes the gasoline to bubble some.  This simply causes some sputtering and slows down filling your vehicle tank a little.  I usually have no problem except on the warmest of summer days so I usually fill before the tank has warmed up.  At some point I will shade the tank and see if I can solve that inconvenience.


I don't believe LP tanks are ever coated inside.  At least this one wasn't.  Can't see the need for it really as water can never get into it when used for LP.  On my tank I've not found any evidence of rust inside on the new steel fittings I installed and haven't found any water yet when I drain gas off the bottom of the tank.

gk

GK, on your setup you could use a water/sediment separator followed by an inline filter if you haven't already put them in place. The separator would let you see what's coming out of the tank and identify rust or water, if present. The inline filter would help you prevent fouling your fuel system or plugging your vehicle's filter in case a problem developed.

It sounds like you've got things well in hand. I'm just adding this in case you hadn't already thought of it.

red_on_black,

Yes, I installed a filter/separator with hose and nozzle to insure against any problems.  It's standard metal cartridge type so I can't see whatever it might be catching but since I made provision with a drain valve on the bottom of the tank from time to time I drain a little to check for water and debris.  That gas goes to the chain saws and lawnmower.

gk

Put me in for Starting Fluid, too. I have many memories of being stuck somewhere and the battery just did not have enough spark to catch gasoline at those low ambient temperatures. Battery power was low, and we couldn't waste any of it. Starting fluid was the rescue of choice to get that engine to catch. Worked each and every time. Yeah, the engine could have been better tuned, probably. Whining about that made no sense, but at that point in time, the goal in front of us was to get the thing started and get out of there. Our lives depended on it. Even though we have now moved to a warmer climate, I still stock a half dozen cans of it on the shelf. Once in a while I bring it out to use it. Good stuff to have around. It is part of my survival prep.

Starting Fluid=Yes
Home Canned Gasoline=No

Set your drag you're going to run out of line.

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