Oil & Fuel Poured Water in Diesel Tank

hunterridgefarm · Jan 30, 2006

Since I have several different size tractors I decided to let my FIL use my Kubota L185 last summer for his garden and to bush hog around his small vineyard. First day he knocked my muffler off and the flasher on the fender. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif. I fixed that and the next week he knocked the muffler off and ran over it with the bushhog /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif. He is in his mid 80's and a good man so I told him not to worry about it I would fix it later.

He called me yesterday and told me he took a jug of water to add some to the radiator and battery...ok...then wasn't thinking and poured some in the fuel tank /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif. Luckily the battery was dead and the motor would not turn over. I don't know why he tried to start it. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif

I'm thinking just drain the tank and replace the fuel filter?
Any thoughts?

Oh, also bring the tractor home /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif.

Highbeam · Jan 30, 2006

You've got to figure that the water is setting on the bottom of the tank unless the engine was turned over after adding the water. You should only have to drain off the water and not the whole tank of fuel. If the tank has a low point drain just dump it until the water is gone. Dump a little more for good measure. Right now, the fuel filter is water free and needs no attention. After running the tractor for a bit I would figure out a way to drain the water off of the filter chamber just to be sure.

Darren · Jan 30, 2006

Sounds like a plan to me. If you had a water separator, it would pull the water out of the fuel. You'd have to drain the bowl on the separator quite a few times.

hunterridgefarm · Jan 30, 2006

The tank does have a low point and I thought about doing just that. He did try to siphon a gallon out of the tank but poured it on a brush pile he was going to burn so I have no idea how much, if any, water he got out.

I have a fuel filter already so I may go ahead and change just to be safe.

Thanks

SnoFalls · Jan 30, 2006

This reminds me of when my MIL was making candles with my wife ... a mold they we're using started to leak, so my MIL poured the molten wax down the sink!

I ended up having to re-plumb the drain line from that sink all the way to the tower ...

Ohh in-laws ...

Soundguy · Jan 31, 2006

Yep.. inlaws.. gotta love them. i remember a couple years ago when my inlaws got a computer. The MIL would send out about 80 emails.. and on dialup that takes a couple minutes.. she would set there for about 30 seconds while the bar showing the mail sent was working it way through.. she would get impatient and keep clicking the send button. her email program would keep sending. I'd get like 20 copies of the same mail every day!!

Next.. her friend that knew just alittle more about computers than she did, was telling her how to do blind CC instead of forwarding all thos email adresses when you do big cc groups.

Well, he was a bit of a snob, and would resend her this long page of instructions ever time he saw an email from her that had email adresses showing in it. What he didn't realize was that many people sent her 'forwarded;' email which dropped all those previous cc adresses into the body, and he was not aware that using the blind CC would not 'get rid' of them. After a week of him resending the 'how to' email page, I finally had to explain to him how a forward mail message works, and why his blind cc wouldn't help it a bit... not sure he ever 'understood'.. but he did stop sending te blind cc 'instruction page out every day... /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Soundguy

willfick · Feb 5, 2006

My early-onset mad cow disease was acting up a couple of years ago and I went to bed leaving the diesel tractor outside, with the fuel cap off, on a night when rain was forecast.
What I did was get about six feet of clear plastic 1/4 tube, fastened a short stick to one end, and stuck it into the tank. Ran enough of the tube into the tank to get some fuel in it and start the syphoning, other end in a bucket on the ground. Got not just all the water out of the tank, but vacuumed a couple years' worth of sediment, too. The clear plastic tube let's you see what's coming out - fun factor of 7.
Afterward added a bottle of "claims to remove water from diesel" additive.
Wm /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

tillerkiller · Feb 5, 2006

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( First day he knocked my muffler off and the flasher on the fender. . I fixed that and the next week he knocked the muffler off and ran over it with the bushhog . )</font>

Why does he hate your muffler so much? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

slowrev · Feb 6, 2006

Sounds like it is just a matter of time before your FIL's lack of attention will result in him getting hurt.
Good luck.
Ben

HEC · Feb 6, 2006

Tractors are not play toys like we somtetimes think, you may get a call your tractor is upside down, hopefully with your fil not under it.My dad started an L235 one day on the ground standing next to it, it was in gear and it ran up over his hip I saw the whole thing and jumped on the tractor and hit the shutoff with it right on top of him.Started it back up and backed it off. He had a rototiller on the back not running but I can't even imagine what it would have done to him anyway if I hadn't been there.He ended up having hip surgery but was ok after that.He knew better than to do that but just wanted to save a little time ,for what I don't know he was retired with all kinds of time.He said he had done that all the time ,he would put it in neutral push on the clutch peddle with one hand and start it up with the other to let it warm up ,only that time he forgot the neutral part.