Midship Fuel Tanks

[tiernanlaw@gmail.com]

All C-Brats:
I am new to the C-Dory. I bought a 1982 27' Cruiser. The boat has not been in the water for almost 20 years. The 4 midship fuel tanks were disconnected, left sealed in place, and the tank system replaced by two 30 gallon portables just aft of the aft bulkhead of the compartment enclosing the four main midship tanks. The last owner bought the boat in this condition and doesn't know why the previous owner did this. I cannot locate the previous owner. Two of the midship tank gauges read full. I can tell there is liquid in two of the tanks by placing a long hose into the filler cap and blowing. I can't get down into the other two tanks. To access the tanks there is just one 8 inch inspection plastic plate that allows you to see the four fuel gauges on top of the corners of the four aluminum tanks. My question(s): Is there any way to inspect, clean, repair the tanks in place or do I just have to cut them out and inspect/clean/replace/reinstall?
Any advise/suggestions/opinions, etc. would be mush appreciated.
Thanks,
Bart

[thataway]

Tom Elliot or one of the other 27 owners would probably have better answers. But if you can access the fuel tank gauges, then you should be able to pull these and find out what is in the tanks. Are there still pickup tubes in place? If so then get an automotive fuel pump, and remove the liquid from these tanks. (There are also ignition protected fuel pumps. This can be safely done, by having the hose going to the pump, off the boat. Have any electrical connections to the pump off the boat. Use a battery off the boat. Have some 5 gallon containers available to receive this liquid.

You should probably consult a professional tank cleaning and inspection service to then assess the tanks.

If this is not available, you can drop a tube into the tank and remove any residual fluid. I probably would wash the tanks with and detergent. Then suck any residual of this out thru the top of the tank (thru the fuel gauge holes. Then you can purge the tanks with CO2 or nitrogen and put a borescope into the tank to inspect the inside. Also at this point you can pressure test the tank...Pressure should not be more than 2 PSI. You may also be able to see some the outside of the tank,, using a borescope thru holes drilled thru the floor or adjacent areas.

It will probably come to having to cut the floor out of the cockpit (not that big a job, pulling the tanks, testing them, and then either replacing or just cleaning and coating. New tanks should be properly treated, primed and coated with coal tar epoxy--and then you can paint if you wish. If properly done the tanks can last many years--decades...

It seems that you may be carrying around a lot of liquid. There could be hundreds of pounds of weight there.

The other issue is the size of the engine. The 130 HP is a fairly "weak" engine--it was used on the 25's (I had a 2003 25 C Dory with a Honda 130) if the boat is light, then it performed fairly well, As weight was added the boat's performance deteriorated . I believe that Tom Elliiot put a 225 on his 27. (The hulls may or may not be identical. )

If an upgrade in the engine is not feasible then you may experiment with props to see which one will give you the best performance with your load. A Permatirm and Trim tabs may also help get the boat on a plane. Try and keep the weight as light as possible.

[T.R. Bauer]

There are not many of these around - even up here. I think I'd be inclined to drain them and see if they leak. And, I suspect they do, which is why there are 2 red tanks on the back. Just curious, does yours have the rebuild transom that they cut out, filled with some miracle stuff, and then put a piece of aluminum plate on with 5200? I wanted to slap them....but it seemed sound enough although ugly and a truly novice repair. If so, those fuel tanks leaked 10-12 years ago when I went and checked it out. If they were not firm on the 30k they wanted for it, it would have followed me home as other than that it was a pretty nice boat with lots of potential.

[tsturm]

[T.R. Bauer]

There are more of them here than anywhere else I suspect. There are a couple in Seward too and one of them is a charter and was for sale last year or the year before - decent boat too! But with that said, it's not like they are overrunning the place....LOL....

[tsturm]