sight glass

[dalem9]

Any one have any idea as to what material to use as a sight gage for my butane tank ? Thanks Dale

 

[Blogwitch]

Dale,

You don't.

Liquefied gas expands at such a rate if the sight glass bursts or gets broken, it would be highly dangerous to even consider it.

Even a rechargeable tank has to be pressure tested to well over 600psi just in case there should be a flame nearby and starts to boil the gas off.

The way the fill volume is controlled on a rechargeable tank is to have a stack pipe on the filler valve that only allows the tank to be filled with a certain amount of gas, this is to allow an empty area (approx 1/3 tank volume) for the liquid to turn into a gas, otherwise you could have neat liquid being fed to the burner, not a good thing to do.

When dealing with these gases, they are usually weighed rather than seen, so maybe small digital scales might be the way to go.


John

 

[shred]

Other ways to find out how much gas is in a tank is to cool it, then set it out for a bit. After a bit, condensation will form where there's liquid and not where there isn't.

 

[dalem9]

Its not really a glass it's more of a plug ,It's about 1inch long 5/8 dia. it's made out of a clear plastic of some sort. It will be for the tank that I am building.Dale

 

[dalem9]

Here is a picture .

 

[dalem9]

John Thanks for the info. I have found some info ,on building this tank .I didn't know about the stack pipe ,this will be easy to make .the tank that I am copieing from has a wall thickness of .062 my wall will be .093 .I have not been able to find much info. on the specks ,I did find that they have to test at 600 psi. Thanks again Dale

 

[Blogwitch]

Dale,

Email sent with dimensions for gas tank.

Sorry, but I gave you the wrong information.

In the UK, we hydraulic test rechargeable tanks to 360psi, not to over 600psi as stated in my last post.


John

 

[dalem9]

Thanks John That was very nice of you. Still looking for what kink of material to make that gage plug out of. I also took apart some old cigarette lighters and got some nice o-rings and other parts that I can reuse.It's amazing what you can find if you just use your head and start looking .Thanks again Dale

 

[dalem9]

I talk to a plastic engineer today an he said that I could use polycarbonate for this part,although he said it may yellow over time ,about 10-15 years .I think that this would be ok for me. Dale