Countdown :: Dapope Hits The Road 13th July 2013

[Dot]

Are you anywhere near Ros?? she may do your ironing

[Kelvin12]

Dadope,

When those bastards stole your fuel did they cut a fuel line or siphon it out. Been thinking about this myself as on my old girl it wouldn't be hard to cut the plastic line and drain away whatever they wanted. Got me thinking about a solenoid shut off at the tank.

Dirk

[Dot]

Got us putting locks on all and every door /bin that opens. Pretty sad isn't it

[dapope]

Hi Dirk and Dot,
They managed to get in via the "lockable" cap, and then replace it. I have a feeling they have been in more than once, as the tank was near full. It holds 113l, which is more than most vehicles. We have quite an ethnic mix in the neighbourhood, but no indigenous people. Think we are one of the few of european descent. They were cunning sods, regardless.
Another day off driving today. Semi retired truckie behind us, taught me a few bits, and given me some ideas of things to do to make life easier. Showed me where i can tap in to setup a compressed air line off the brake tanks to run a rattle gun, and tire pump.

[Kelvin12]

My fuel line is right up the back and low down really easy to get at and obvious to any one who knew what they were looking at. Been on my mind for a while now, even if they only wanted a few liters and cut the line I would loose the lot 600 lts. That would be a disaster and my life isn't worth that much.....

Dirk

[Dot]

Hope you will be sharing those hints with the rest of us please.

[Kelvin12]

If I give away how easy it is then every piece of vermin in the country will be milking my brand of bus.

However will pass on my "secrets" later and photos when its done..... still in the planning/thinking stages at the moment after Dadopes thing. Reckon this sort of thing, "stealing fuel" will be high on the list again with the price we are paying. Brings to mind of a situation in America, (of course where else) where a potential fuel thief siphoned some fuel, or what he though was fuel, but turned out to be the motor homers black tank.....

Dirk

[Dot]

Maybe some smart person could design a small nasty tank (with some of that black stuff) where the fuel line is blocked when stopped and a flap diverts the thieves pipe to the nasty tank. suck it and see

[BruceS]

Martin I'm presuming you got good advice but I know one person who tapped into their air tank in the wrong place (bottom) & got a very minute bit of oil go out of their air hose for pumping up tyres. Oil & rubber doesn't go well together!!!

[T1 Terry]

During the big petrol rationing thing may yrs back, gangs were working the streets with a lump of timber and a bolt through the end sharpened to a point. They would use bricks or lumps of wood to make a foundation pivot point so the lump of timber with the spike on the end could quickly puncture the fuel tank, a babies bath under the vehicle and bugger off out of sight till the babies bath was full. Then pour that into 20ltr drums, throw them in the back of a van and off. No fuel security devices will stop that one if the fuel thank is exposed from under the vehicle.
Fortunately, LPG tanks are a tad tricky to syphon, Kombi's have their fuel tank up high, but the Ford would be vulnerable, although the plastic tanks these days would put up a bit of a fight.
Then there is the guy who was pumping fuel out of the service station tanks, a hole through the floor of the van and drop the pump hose in, fill the 205ltr drums, pull the hose up and drive away. lots of video footage of a plain black van stopping, then later driving away, number plates belonged to an unregistered horse float, no idea if they ever caught him.
As far as stopping them syphoning via the fuel filler, those coil spring things forced down the filler neck work well, you can’t get a syphon hose down past them