top skimming.

[GedsJeep]

so, as im moving house, i want to scale down my filtering system.

i`m going to have 4 drums.

coarse voil
50M and dewatering conical.
10m
1m

i want to set up a floating pick up in each of the drums as i have plenty of tam`s.

the last drum will feed directly to the car via another tam and nozzle (unless i can find a cheap clean 600L ibc and top skim that.)

so, ideas for an easy, reliable floating pick up please

and what hose is flexible enough to use without collapsing.

[oakwoodtv]

http://www.biopowered.co.uk/wiki/Top_skimming_fueling_tank

Like this one.

[knighty]

why not just fit exit pipe a foot up off the bottom ?

even with top skimming you'll need to drain the stuff out the bottom eventually ?


or... why not just sheet filter ?

I used to have 4 x 205 chutney drums on top of an ibc with sheet filters in them, oil drained through the sheets and down into the IBC - it's the only filtering I ever did and had zero problems running through common rail vans which by all accounts are pretty fussy about good oil


for the filters... I sent my mother off to a charity shop, she picked up some big thick bed sheets for about a quid each

then sown into a pillow case shape on her sowing machine

then I folded the top edge over and sowed it down, a bit like a big sleeve... posted a bit of that hard blue water pipe into it


meant the sheet ended up like a big pillow case with a hard ring at the top - sat onto of a drum great - I used to brim them with oil and they lasted for years

I'd pull them out every few thousand litres, scrap the thick stuff off and run them through my washing machine - came out like new


must have used the same 4 sheets for about 5 years

[Julian]

This is the floating pickup from my bio dispensing tank ...




In case it's not obvious from the photo, from the top ...

Float from a ball cock - bolt with chain link welded on - strip of copper soldered to - fine stainless steel mesh soldered into a tube with a copper disk soldered on to block the top - hose clip clamping the assembly to - flexible tube from one of those barrel siphon hand pumps, typically this ...



It's worked faultlessly for about 5 years with bio, but I'd guess you may need to replace the fine mesh for something with less resistance otherwise the hose may try and concertina with the suction.

[GedsJeep]

the filters are fine mate, its just the pick ups that i wanted.

i dont want to drill the drums either.

now using the link above but changing it to pex at julians suggestion i think i could make something fairly easy.

pex down to bottom of drum then the elbows with the o rings removed as per the wiki design.

best of both worlds. easy changeable and best design to boot.

the outlets from each pump will be open, so no chance of blowing it all apart either.

thanks people.

[Keef]

Just a thought ... won't you need a self priming pump if you do that?

[GedsJeep]

nope, coz once it`s primed, the pickup is below the oil level.