Calling all Generator Owners

subscribe

Great tips guys, keep 'em coming.

The fuel tanks can be an issue, DRMO has them empty and they suck humidity, leading to rusting. Sometimes BAD rusting.

This will lead to frequent filter changing and lots of headache if not cleaned out FULLY.

First, if you can get them hot tanked, DO SO. The solder joints may fail, no biggie since they are riveted and can be resoldered. If the tank ends up with pinholes, these too can be fixed with solder or welding. I prefer welding as it is tougher and is the best course if dealing with extensive corrosion.

All the fittings can be removed by desoldering and removal of the copper pull rivets by drilling. McMaster-Carr has the copper pull rivets. Pulling the cap boss/strainer bracket will enable full inspection and scrubbing to remove all scale. In mine, the corrosion was the pitting form, making 1/4 inch divots on the inside. I drilled these out to full thickness as chasing thin metal is no fun.

Since most of the holes were on the bottom, I taped off the top openings and back-purged the tank with argon before welding. I used thin 0.023" MIG wire as filler with TIG process. You can do the same with MIG, should work fine. It took me several tries to stop all leaks and make it look good inside and out.

Once the welding was done, I used hammer and dolly to make sure all fitting boss areas fit well, then cleaned and riveted the bosses back in place. Flux and solder sealed all fittings and all weld areas were coated with solder for corrosion prevention on the outside.

Now, to stop corrosion inside, I used a fuel tank sealer from POR, similar to the Paint Over Rust product. The entire inside is coated per the instructions, I used plastic plugs on all the pipe thread bosses to keep the threads clean. The excess material was drained by puncturing the bottom plastic pipe plug.

After a year, the tank bottom is sill clean and gray as seen through the fuel. The MEP-002A starts and runs with ease. Aside from the air filter restriction indicator missing, it is fully operational. I don't ever plan to operate it in a dust storm.

Do you guys add something to the fuel to increase lubricity. I have been add some 2 stroke just incase.

I use 2 cycle motor oil at a mix of 200:1. I use the 2 cycle oil because it has additives that are blended to burn clean and add lubrication.

Caswell's phenolic epoxy liner may be something to consider instead of the POR products. It's one of the few liners that's resistant to the current gasoline blends, for example, and makes a thicker coating than the POR stuff. Also, since it's a 2-part epoxy, it doesn't have to air dry to harden. We motorcycle guys have been able to seal tanks with lots of pinholes this way, without welding.

Drain the tank yearly, even if kept full. I just did mine, had about 1/4 cup of slime and water in it. All cleaned and fresh fuel now.

this is a great thread was very helpful. now off to the trouble shooting part of the tm. generator starts but as soon as i let off the starter it dies.

wont build oil pressure. lookin like a bad oill pump any reccomendations?

Does it have oil? Check the pressure relief spring and ball, it can stick open. You will have to pull the engine.

couchilla said:

Don't know if this is the right place to ask this question. Does anyone know of a civilian replacement for radiator cap on MEP004A? And if this post is in wrong place let me know where to post question. Thanks for any help.

Click to expand...

I found a replacement. Stant 10293

I am new to this site and have already learned allot. I am considering a MEP002 in the near future.


Below is cost effective trick I used to clean-out rusty and gummy tanks and what I have done to repair/line the tanks once cleaned:


1) Drain and remove the tank.
2) Add pee-gravel or small stones. You need enough to cover up the tank's bottom and a little extra. I have put in as much as 1/2 inch above the bottom.
3) Not a requirement: Add cutting fluid to help remove gum buildup. Add enough to to just cover the stones, adjust accordingly. Diesel fluid or turpentine works well.
4) Shake the tank back and forth for a few minutes.
5) If the cutting fluid gets too dirty, then, drain it and replace it with new fluid. Repeat as necessary.
6) Rotate the tank and repeat the process to the other sides (6 total) that may need cleaning.
7) remove the stones from the tank
rinse out the tank with cutting fluid. It may take several rinsing to get all the residue out
9) let dry


How I fixed pin holes is to solder them closed from outside. I then use an Epoxy based chemical to line the tank's inside. Although I have not tried it, a prior post discussed using plastic bolts to cover the tank's inlet and outlet fittings threads. A hole is drilled into the plastic bolt to drain the chemicals used to line the tank.

See the other prior post on what other options are to line the tank's bottom and address pin holes.


Note: I used this technique to remove the rust inside the tank and any gum buildup.



Phil

I've done this to clean really gummy tanks, but I use lacquer thinner because it dissolves the varnish. I shake the gravel around for a while, and then let the tank sit for a couple hours with the lacquer thinner doing its job, and repeat until it's clean. One tank took a week or so to get down to metal. My experience has been with gasoline tanks that had a thick layer of tar-like goo in them though, so I'm only guessing that lacquer thinner would be good on diesel tanks.

thanks for the tip.

Xylene is my favorite for the tar like gunk in diesel tanks.

rickf said:

Xylene is my favorite for the tar like gunk in diesel tanks.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip. I suspect acetone would also work well. I use it to remove stains and gum from things when nothing else works. Some disadvantages are its fast evaporation rate and it is more expensive than most of the other fluids discussed earlier.

Acetone is what one of the fuel tank coating kits uses to clean tanks before coating.

Does anyone know if there is a overall generator inspection and quality check that the military uses for their service centers? I'm looking for an actual checklist and steps to train a someone with a high school education how to inspect and incoming generator - document it's condition and then record that information on a spreadsheet or other checklist document.

Who in the one to call when solving problems after the purchase, sometimes I for one, can't see every problem. I think I need a VR card..who can help with findingparts?

Burney - not knowing what you have makes this a little more complicated but generically, your first stop is to get all three TMs for your genset and read through the description and diagnosis parts of the operator's and maintenance manuals. They're freely available as PDFs and include detailed troubleshooting procedures.

Second step is to identify your symptoms and search here and in the wiki for any clever tricks somebody has come up with for diagnosis or repair of your unit. There's a lot of knowledge written down here and the smaller gensets are really pretty simple systems. Chances are very good that somebody has talked about the diagnosis and repair of exactly your problem(s). If not, post in a new thread and one of a number of knowledgeable and helpful people will walk you through it.

Once you've got the problem figured out, you may need parts. This can be a challenge depending on model, but again some searching will often reveal the commercial source of the military part (as with MEP002/003 injection pump parts) or acceptable replacements (as with electric fuel pumps).

Speaking specifically of the VR card, you've got complete diagnostics in the TMs. At the end of those you will know for sure if it's the cards or the windings or something else. Triple Jim has an improved replacement for the MEP002/003 VR card available now (see the for sale forum). I know that there has been discussion of replacing VR cards in most MEP gensets with commercial equivalents. Again, search is your friend.