a wrote in
:

On Sep 19, 6:00*pm, Bertie the Bunyip wrote:
" wrote in
news:7b0f558c-1f70-462f-
:



On Sep 19, 3:47*pm, Bertie the Bunyip wrote:

No, nothing to do with the sump drains themselves. The sump area
is a small depession at the bottom of the tank. All water in the
tank shoul
d
go there by design. However most tanks have small imperfections in
the
m
where water can get into and stick there. You do a nice calm
walkaroun
d
and drain your fuel and then when you start taxying, the water
becomes dislodged and gets into a feed port. With some designs,
this can add u
p
to a lot of water...

Gotchya, gotchya and gotchya, never thought of what you say, and
makes perfect sense.

Tanks I have are "stainless steel" and not bladders, so I
**think**I have a lesser risk of water settling where it shouldn't
be but like you say, a good shake would be prudent to better assure
the water indeed does settle down to the sumps so it gets sumped
out.

Depends on the type, but tin tanks are no kind of insurance against
it. T
ry
it sometime. Drain some fuel, if there's some water, drain it all out
and then shake the airplane. Pretty sure you;ll get some more.

BTW, you're tanks are more than likely aluminum. I could be wrong,
but I'
ve
never seen stainless tanks in any airplane.

Bertie



Big design flaw on the early M20J (Mooney 201) was the fuel tanks were
wet wing, and the seam sealant failed. If one smells gas in flight it
is NOT good, and we did. Huge pain in the ass to reseal. The other
thing about those tanks is the fuel caps were a little tricky to put
back right (this was back in the old days when the fuel truck would
come to the airplane) and if they were not put on right rain got in
big time. Nothing like draining a tank in a rain storm while wearing a
suit!


Yeah, I know the caps you're talking about. They were a bitch to get on.
I sem to remember a lot of Mooneys having bladders, though. Earlier ones
maybe? Maybe wood wing airplanes?


Bertie