Many boat captains are not aware of the need for Bilge Fuel. This is kind of frightening when you consider that nothing works without some kind of fuel, right?!? After having been away from my boat for awhile, I checked the bilge in my sailboat today. I was very pleased to find a good supply of diesel fuel pooled there.
Ok, “pleased” probably isn’t the correct term. Of course, diesel fuel (any fuel) in the bilge is NOT good or appropriate. I clearly had a problem. So, the search began. I must be a fear-monger or something as the worst possible problems came to mind first. A leaking fuel tank is the worst case. As I started poking about I found that the clues (trail of fuel) ended at the engine (it is downhill from my tank, to the engine, to the bilge). My last trip encountered some rather rough conditions and, more importantly to this investigation, the “out of fuel” problem documented here. This problem led me to remove all fuel filters and purging the fuel system while looking for the problem. As near as I could tell, the trail of fuel was near the on-engine fuel filter. So, only one thing to do. I fired up the engine and watched. After a few minutes, it was clear that fuel was weeping out from the purge screw on the top of this fuel filter. A few seconds later after the turn of wrench, no more fuel leak. Oh, what a wonderful feeling! Not that I fixed a problem but that the problem was so minor.
Of course, this wonderful feeling dissipated a bit during the cleanup…. The second time that I sopped out the bildge, I kept the contents in the cup in this photo. After sitting for a while, the diesel settled (mostly) to the top. You can see that there isn’t much fuel there but obviously enough to cause a smelly mess.
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