Making a Super Sucker

[evo45]

I made my super sucker over the past couple weeks, it has been an adventrue! I bought 250 gallon propane tank 2.5 weeks ago and started airing it out. Airing out the propane tank for 3 days is not enough to weld on it!

I aired out the tank and cut a 4" hole in the top to weld in a 3" bung to put the 2" pick up tube in.

I started to weld the fitting in and got 1/3 the way around the fitting and the arc lit the fumes. When the fumes lit they shot a flame out the bung that I was welding on and burned my welding mask and my face!:doh: I didnt get burned bad, just lost some hair. I am telling this story to inform everyone of my misfortune.

After this happened I figured out how to weld on the tank correctly, fill it with water! Since I had already burned what ever was in the tank and filled it with water I was told to put a shop vac on it and leave the vents open.

This made air flow in the tank and pulled any fumes out as well. I was also told you could put dry ice into the water and that would creat co2 and purge the tank as well. What ever you do BE CAREFULL!! Do this at your own risk.

Now that it is all done I'll show some more pics.

Here the tank is all welded up, and leak tested. In order to get my weld to seal up I hooked up the vacuum pumps that I am going to vac the tank down with and that pulled the weld into the holes. It worked great and sealed up all of the little pin holes, there were alot!

This is what I used to make the skids to pick the tank up with and put it into the bed of my truck. I am going to use my forklift to put it into the bed under the topper.

I was concerned with getting oil in into my vacuum pumps so I used a Banjo y filter that I packed with oil absorbent pad. This should keep any thing out of the pumps.

I also have 70' of 2" Nitrile hose to do pick ups with.

I also made a pick up tube out of 2" pvc.

 

[Ad8 PRODIGY]

Whats a Super Sucker?

 

[vcassens]

:whs:

 

[evo45]

A super sucker is a vacuum tank used to pick up either wmo or wvo. I run my truck on w85 and will use it to go pick up waste motor oil. I was using a pump to pick up the oil with but it was slower than this will be. I tested out picking up water with it over the weekend and it emptied a 50 gallon trash can in 5 seconds.

I have 2 little thomas vacuum pumps,

the pumps are attached to a frame that will hang off the side of the skid. I will plug the pumps into the 7 pin connector in the bed of my truck.

I will use the pumps to vacuum the tank down to 20 in-hg, negative 9-11 psi, and the tank will suck up anything, even cold wvo.

I will post a video of it in action when it is all done. I still need to add a drain to the bottom and paint it.

 

[neverkickn]

Cool setup!

 

[evo45]

This is what I made but changed a couple things. I didnt use an inlet and and outlet. I am going to use just the top for pickups and to pump the tank out. The drain I want to put on the bottom is just to get water out occasionally if I pick up any antifreeze.

This guy has a video of it in action on youtube as well. It is very fast for picking up waste oils.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy__8RynP1g&feature=related

 

[Ad8 PRODIGY]

Now it makes sense. Thats a chit ton of pumping power lol.

 

[Mdub707]

Guys started making these when they realized how hard it was to pump cold WVO. A good super sucker will drain a 55 gal drum of WVO in minutes in sub freezing temps!

evo45, great job man! That came out really well. I really want to do one of these myself, hard to find those propane tanks though!

 

[evo45]

I have been watching Craigslist for 8 months looking for a tank. I had found others but they were 6-8 hours away from my house 1 way. I couldn't justify driving that far for a tank. My 2" nitrile lines came from massachusetts, I found them on allofcraigslist.org. The guy that owned them asked where I was going to have them shipped and when I told him he said his brother was driving down to my city the next week. I paid $300 shipped for seven 10' sections of 2" nitrile fuel line and four 2" ball valves, all with camlok fittings. It was a steal compared to what I was pricing the line for.

 

[evo45]

I took a pic of the pumps attached to the side of the tank. The pumps are just hanging on the skid. I have a pic of how I did it but photobucket's mobile app sux!

 

[evo45]

The time has come that I am no longer going to be makin my own fuel. I am goin to sell my wmo stuff and try and recoup some money invested in my parts. I figured I would start with selling my super sucker. I dont really know how much it is worth but I have $275 in just the tank and $300 in 2" cam loc fuel grade hose. I have 70' of the hose in 10' sections which makes it easy to get to what ever you need. The most I have used is 40' tho. Even at that length it will move oil faster than my 220 volt hydraulic pump. I have $200 in my Vacuum pumps that work great. They dont have much run time on them since I havent used the super sucker but 4 times.

I am not expecting to make money on this thing but I dont want to loose my A$$ either. It is built like a tank (lol!) and works great. It will move oil faster than any other pump I have seen. The oil recycler cant even pick up oil as fast as this thing will move it. I can load it for you with the fork lift into the bed of your longbed truck or put it onto a trailer for you. It has bigger feet welded to the bottom so it spreads the weight. I have also added 3 hooks to the side to hang the hose and the pick up tube on. It still needs to be painted but it was always under the topper and no one could see it so I didnt care.

Send me an email, [email protected] if you are interested in it and want to talk numbers. I will give my phone number in an email.

Thanks
Vic

 

[neverkickn]

I remember when you built this. Can't imagine it not working less than fantastic.

Might want to pull your email down though and just comunicate through pm. Spammers will get it and light you up.

 

[evo45]

That is my spammer email, I have Craigslist goin there too. I still check it but it doesn't bother me if the hit it.

The super sucker works awesome! If I had more room I would keep it and just collect oil to sell to the recycler but I am getting rid of all my extra warehouse space and won't have a place to store it. I dont know how much the guys who make super sucker sell them for but I'll give someone a good deal on this one. I can load it with a forklift and can ship it cheaper that way. Let me know guys.