how much left in gallons?

[riverposie]

I have a 275 gallon fuel oil tank and i measured with a stick to have 12 inches on the stick...Can anyone tell me approx. how many gallons are left? I have a 70x 14 mobile home in Pa. and the furnace hardly runs as of yet....about once an hour and i am trying to figure uot how long i can wait before i have to order oil..I am trying to wait for the price to ease up a little....thanks Bob

[Mark]

Without the physical internal dimensions of the tank, there's no way to say.

[Eugene]

The only way to tell is to measure the amount remaining, fill the tank and subtract the amount you purchased from the tank capacity.
But know this, if you let it run out or get too low, you can pick up a lot of unwanted debris through your furnace.

[Jane]

Order the oil price is going up not down

[Kevin C]

If the tank is 3 ft deep and you have 1 ft of oil, you have 1/3 of 275 or about 90 gallons remaining. If the tank is 4 ft. deep you have 1/4 a tank or about 68 gallons left. Next problem is how much oil a day do you burn? No way to tell that as the colder it gets, the more you will burn.
I'd fill the tank. As Eugene says you don't want it to get to low cause you don't want any debris to go into your furnace, and you don't want to run out of fuel in the middle of the seasons first blizzard.

[Dr. Craig Whisler CA]

If you can get the measurements of your tank try this:

Call any fuel dealer and ask how many gallons there are in one cubic foot of oil.

Then measure the length and width of your tank and then measure the heigth of the fuel in your tank using a homemade dipstick.. Multiply these three numbers then divide the product by the number of gals in one cubic foot and you should have an exact answer.

I am from sunny California so I don't know if your tank is burried underground or located in a cellar where it can be measured.

If you have an underground tank that can't be measured, try to mesure the verticle height from top to bottom and mark the measurement off on a dipstick. You need to measure the tank interior only, and not the spout. If it is underground you can probably determine the spout length with a piece of wire such a straightened coat hangar. Bend an "L" shaped hook about 1 inch long on the bottom end and then lower it into the tank and probe for the lip at the tank top. I would tie a safety string on the wire first in case you drop it in the tank. When you put the dipstick in and can see how much fuel is left, convert, this number to a percentage of the total gallonage. You should then be able to easily convert the percentage to a gallons per unit of liner measure figure with a little more calcuating, because you already know the tank capacity in gallons.

Getting the fuel level too low may suck botton debris into your furnace and clog the jets just like it will do with low fuel levels on fuel-injection cars. You should never let you fuel get down below about 1/8th of a tank.

It that doesn't work at least it will teach you not to listen to a Southwesterner about subjects that relate to Northwestern's problems. :~)

Regards, doc