Farmers?

I don't know if this will be of help or not. We use dyed fuel since all of our equipment is off road. Last I looked it was either red or purple. (If you need to know the exact color I can ask DH) Now then. As for storage, we have an old fashioned above-ground tank, like a 300-gallon barrel on legs. It uses gravity flow to fuel the tractors. Until we got our biggest one, a John Deere 4430, this was sufficient. I think if we got anything bigger than the 4430 we'd have to get a different set up. (We make a lot of hay and have several smaller tractors instead of big ones for lots of row-crop acres.) Anyway, fuel is delivered once a month or as-needed during busy times. The co-op has several delivery route drivers who have tanker trucks. As far as security, the farm is back a long lane with fences on either side, so someone could block the lane with the tractor with duals. (This just happened -- DH started it and it gelled up about 100 yards farther. *sigh*) The tank has a plain old slot and loop for a padlock. Once gas got up to $3 a gallon we got padlocks for both the gas and diesel tanks. One more security measure: a big dog ..... ;-) There are lot of shady characters who do not want to tangle with a dog.

You don't mean anhydrous, do you? For cooking meth? That's a whole 'nother ball of wax. (ETA -- if you mean anhydrous ammonia, the product that dyes the fertilizer itself, the thief, containers and the meth itself is called Glo-Tel or Glo-Tell. Something like that.)

Hope that helped ...
Ann

Hi Nancy, Stolen fuel would have to be transported in appropriate containers - small theft - a five gallon gas can (there are some that are different colors for kerosene or diesel fuel); middle sized theft - a 55 gallon drum specifically for fuel (has a port on the top for filling and dispensing); large theft - a fuel tanker of some type.

We had about 500 gallons of fuel oil stolen from an underground tank a number of years ago - that had to have been with a tanker. Our diesel fuel and farm gas is stored in tanks on stilts as Hoosiergirl described.

Red dye is usually added to non-road types of fuel to differentiate it from fuel used for road use that is subject to a road use tax. The red dye wouldn't identify it as stolen - just as originally sold for farming or other non-highway use.

Hope that helps some. Puma

Hi Nancy - No, a farmer can't add dye to a fuel with impunity - all fuels are very heavily regulated by the government. The government adds the red dye. No farmer I know would add anything to his fuel to mark it. And the fuel looks the same whether it's bought in Ohio or Kansas. You can't differentiate it.

Smell - fuels smell and the smell is distinctive. If you get it on your pants it will be pretty noticeable. The dye will not be very noticeable unless it would be on white cloth (not very common in farming communities except undershirts). I don't think there's any way to make fuel not smell.

Farmers don't store fuel in tanks by the road (unless by chance their house / barn is right by the road. Fuel tanks are usually close to the barns and close to the driveway (have to be for trucks to get in to fill them.) A lot of farmers have barking dogs just for the purpose of alerting them to intruders and possible theft.

When you put fuel into a piece of farm equipment you basically unlock the fueling mechanism (like the hose on a gas pump) and turn it on. As Hoosiercowgirl said - it's gravity feed - the tank's higher than the piece of equipment you're putting fuel in, so it just runs down. There could be a pump on the tank to make it faster, but other than that, there's no special way of transferring it. In your scenario, if the filler on the service truck is on the top of the truck, there would have to be a pump to move the fuel higher (siphoning might work also).

With your scenario and your parameter requirements, maybe you ought to shift to water theft. It would be easier to work with and is becoming more of an issue. Keep at it. Puma

NancyMehl said:

Puma and Cowgirl,

Here is the premise: a couple of men are behind the theft of diesel fuel from farms spread out all over the state. One of the men has an old service truck with a fuel tank. Remember that when this tank truck is driving down the road it has to be DOT legal with a driver who has a CDL-B with haz-mat, tank, and air brake endorsement. Otherwise, if a cop stops it, it will be put out of service and parked. When the farmer is sleeping, the thief drives onto the farmer's land (having the fuel stored next to a road is one possibility) and steals the fuel. You need a pump. The pump could be on the truck, either driven off the electrical system or a PTO. I'd go with an electric pump as it is quieter. You need hard suction hoses to avoid collapse. You could get an electrical pump that is not attached to the truck like a sump pump. Flow rate is going to be very important here. At 10 gpm (gallons per minute), it would take fifty minutes to empty a 500 gallon tank. At 100 gpm, you reduce this down to 5 minutes. Then, he takes it back to his place - and eventually it is delivered to another farmer who is willing to buy the questionable fuel for a discount. There's no way to identify the fuel as stolen, so this would easily be done. The two thieves are splitting the money.

If you're willing, when I get to the details (like exactly how the fuel is transferred into the service truck), I would love to have you explain how it would be done.

As far as the dye: so a farmer can add the dye to his fuel without any problem? I got into one site that made it sound as if you had to have permission from a government agency to add dye to diesel fuel. Is this right? The dye is added due to road tax. Diesel for over-the-road vehicles pay a significant road tax. Off-road vehicles like tractors do not have to pay this tax. At weight stations, trucks can be "dipped" to see whether they are using off-road fuel. Fines are massive. If the dipped fuel shows a trace of the dye, then you get to write a big check to the government. The dye is added at the refinery. Reality is you don't want the dye in the fuel. If you can get some fuel oil or diesel without the dye, you can put it in your truck, as a savings of something like $0.50 per gallon.

And another question: if you got the fuel on your pants, would the red dye stain them? (So someone might mistake the stain for something else?) And...would the smell of the fuel be so strong, it would be obvious to anyone nearby that they were smelling fuel? (I need it to NOT smell!) Fuel smells. If your house is heated by fuel oil (which is very similar to diesel), you've smelled it. It will get into your clothes and you will smell. The dye will not stain your clothes as it is a very low concentration.

Thanks for any additional help. If you're willing to be a source for me, I will mention you in my acknowledgements and send you a copy of the book when it comes out in November. If you need more, feel free to PM me.

Nancy

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Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

The best time to rob a farm is about 10 a.m. Sunday morning. Then most everyone would be at church. Just a thought

ETA, I agree that the dye itself doesn't stain anything but if you spill diesel fuel on your clothes, it's pretty distinctively stinky.


Ann