Safety

DO YOU SMELL GAS?

Get all residents, guests, pets out of the house and away from the area!
Please extinguish any open flames and refrain from using lights, appliances, or phones while inside to reduce the possibility of creating a spark for potential ignition.
Go out and turn off main valve to all tanks (turn clockwise / all the way to the right to cut off gas flow)
Call our Office at 716-355-6363 or 1-800-723-9213. A qualified technician is on call 24/7 to assist.
If you feel that it is necessary, we also encourage you to contact emergency services to make them aware of the potential hazard.
Do not re-enter the building until qualified personnel has run a leak test and corrected the problem, determining the system leak free.

How To Read Your Gauge

The most commonly recognized is the Float Gauge, that screws directly into the top of the tank and has an easy-to-read dial attached. This is a percentage gauge (not a pressure gauge) used to monitor the liquid level in the tank periodically, usually reads full around 80%. The general rule of thumb is to call around 30% to give your supplier time to get you put into a route. Almost every residential propane tank actually has 2 gauges, the other is what the driver uses to ensure the tank is filled to the correct level. This fixed liquid level gauge, or bleeder, will let out vapor until the liquid in the tank reaches 80% and liquid propane will start to spray out, indicating that the tank is full.

Learn to Identify Potential Issues

There are many potential issues that can arise over time from general wear and tear. With the knowledge of what to look for, you can spot and notify your supplier of small issues before they become big problems.

Kinked Lines

One of the most common causes of leaks outside is kinked copper tubing. This happens when the soft copper gas piping is bent excessively or incorrectly which can cause leaking or gas flow restrictions if not addressed. It can be difficult to identify the difference between an appropriate bend and a kink, especially with the yellow plastic coating used in outdoor applications of copper tubing.

Leaning/Tipping

Another common issue we see is when a propane tank starts to lean. Your standard 500-gallon propane tank when full at 80% will weigh roughly 2700lbs. Combine that with the freezing and thawing or even just wet ground conditions and you have a recipe for shifting, leaning, sinking, or in extreme cases roll-over, despite how well prepared your pad may be at the time of the tank set. Luckily this is a common issue and easily resolved if caught and addressed in a timely manner. The goal at the time of set is to get the tank as level as reasonably possible, so keep an eye out for the tank leaning, change in where the legs rest on the blocks, or the warping/cracking/crumbling of whatever base happens to be under your tank.

Sticky Gauge

One problem that is not preventable and difficult to catch early is a malfunctioning Float Gauge. The hard part about having moving parts inside of a pressurized and closed system like that is that there's no way to monitor the health of your parts and pieces. As the float arm pivots up and down over time, the elbow can catch. This will cause the dial on the gauge to show an incorrect percentage, leading to runouts. The simplest way to prevent an issue is to have your supplier install a monitor, which sends a daily reading to your supplier and alerts if it remains unchanged for a certain number of days. Another way to catch if before it becomes an issue is to have already been keeping a close eye on your dial readings and have a decent idea of your normal usage. This can be rather tough with the sporadic warm and cold spells we have in the northeast.