Can I buy a fuel truck and fuel my airplane?

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stevensun

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Stevensun
I see an airport just 50 miles away has $1 dollar cheaper per gallon of 100LL. Can I just buy a 750 gallon fuel truck. Go fuel it up. And save myself 750 bucks each trip?
 
I’m guessing you’re not serious. I mean, I don’t know how how much the fuel truck will cost, but I would guess it’s more cost effective to fill up there and just fly home.
 
Kritchlow said:
I’m guessing you’re not serious. I mean, I don’t know how how much the fuel truck will cost, but I would guess it’s more cost effective to fill up there and just fly home.
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Let's just say fuel truck is 20k. If my flight school uses 100 gallons each day..
 
Might be even cheaper if you can get an account with a distributer and simply have it delivered to your place. You will need to either buy a truck or set up a tank system, depending on usage rate.
 
I knew a guy who had a Jetranger at a small airport with no fuel. He had a big plastic tank, maybe 250-300 gallons, on a small trailer.
 
Yes you can. There are a few things you need:
- driver with a hazmat endorsement
- a roadworthy fuel truck
- insurance against things like groundwater contamination
- permission from the airport to bring your truck in (which they typically have to give to an 'individual user' but may come with conditions).
- a place to legally park the truck between uses (x ft from a hangar, impermeable surface)

The airport may also require you to file a monthly report on how much fuel you used and charge you a flowage charge on it.
 
Craig said:
Might be even cheaper if you can get an account with a distributer and simply have it delivered to your place. You will need to either buy a truck or set up a tank system, depending on usage rate.
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That.

Now, if you bought mogas, then you could really cut the cost. Plus, you could swing by and gas up my ride on your way back to your airport and save me from having to schlep the 5 gallon cans. Win, Win. :)
 
Sounds great right up until you price truck registration an insurance these days.
 
Over 119 gallons triggers “bulk transport” regulations. Your supplier may not dispense if truck and driver aren’t in compliance. If you can get around that I’d be more concerned with insurance and liability. I carried a fuel tank in my pickups for 25 years until a year ago.
 
Kritchlow said:
Okay... don’t think you mentioned you owned a flight school.
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I’m guessing he’s not actually 22 than. :rolleyes:

Didn’t we have a thread not long ago about a guy wanting to buy a large fuel tank and start pumping his own fuel to save coin? This sounds strikingly similar...
 
No, my new house has a fuel tank for avgas. I sold my truck setup on Facebook in about 10 minutes since truck tanks are very common in Alaska. My insurer never knew and wouldn’t have covered anything fuel tank related if they had.
 
Ryanb said:
I’m guessing he’s not actually 22 than. :rolleyes:.
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Based on his questions, he's more likely to be 22 than to own a flight school. When he said "my flight school" I assumed he was either an instructor or student at the flight school. Most flight school owners would know the basics of the economics and legalities of transporting a large amount of fuel onto a field. He also asked on another thread whether insurance would cover the cost of a split wheel hub. I wouldn't expect someone new to all of this to know these things either...
 
stevensun said:
Let's just say fuel truck is 20k. If my flight school uses 100 gallons each day..
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If you own the flight school and you're burning through 100 gal/day why would you even consider paying retail for fuel? Buy a 5k gal tank, buy your fuel direct from the supplier and have them deliver it to your tank.
 
Brad Z said:
Based on his questions, he's more likely to be 22 than to own a flight school. When he said "my flight school" I assumed he was either an instructor or student at the flight school. Most flight school owners would know the basics of the economics and legalities of transporting a large amount of fuel onto a field. He also asked on another thread whether insurance would cover the cost of a split wheel hub. I wouldn't expect someone new to all of this to know these things either...
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Correct. That was a tongue and cheek comment on my part. :)
 
Once you're doing this for a commercial operation over the open roads, you're going to need to fully comply with CDL requirements and DOT hazmat rules. There's a whole world of difference between running a fuel truck around inside an airport and doing it on the highways.
 
IK04 said:
The gas station down the road just buried a plastic gasoline tank the size of a school bus. Yep.
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How does grounding and anti-static work with a plastic tank? My dad has a big plastic tank for water at his home and the instructions prohibited flammable liquids. Our in-ground tanks at the FBO were 20k + gallon metal tanks.
 
They make conductive plastic for that purpose.
 
You could buy a truck and you could have a distributor deliver to you.

But do you want to?

Leaving all the responsibility and legalities aside, consider:

Avgas price from a distributor is about $2.50/gal. So you save maybe $2 a gallon? When are you ever going to go through 10,000 gallons of avgas to make that worth your while? Set aside the hassle of all the rest of it, there IS a reason everyone doesn't just do this.
 
I used to see a local private airport owner buy fuel from our county airport with a 250 gallon plastic tote bin in his truck bed. He then transferred that fuel to a tank at his airport. Not the safest thing I ever witnessed...but he did this on a routine basis.
 
All places/airports I have been based at don't allow tanker to tanker transfers so one would need a fixed tank. With that, there has to be a containment system, likely EPA and locally approved and also likely an insurance requirement to go with that. There is also extra cost in getting anything less than about 4,000 gallons delivered at a time, in a lot of places. It looks to me that the self-fueling option is really only viable for an operator that is running multiple aircraft a day.
 
Ryanb said:
He doesn’t own the flight school - can just about guarantee that...
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Correct about that, do have friends who owns their own and flies quite a lot. Just want to know what’s out there for options. Said flight school to just make people not saying “I assume you are joking”
 
Many distributors only sell avgas by the 'full truck' 8000Gal or '1/2 truck'. Competing airports will at times arrange for a split load to make the transportation cost palatable. Different from HHO, D2 and off road gasoline, only a few distributors have a distribution type truck full of Avgas making the rounds to dispense piddly amountts like 750gallons to individual customers.
 
You could always discuss with the local fuel vendor about "interline" your fuel. Essentially, you buy a large load of fuel and have it deposited in their fuel farm, then you pay the vendor XXX amount to pump it into your aircraft.
 
Doug Reid said:
I used to see a local private airport owner buy fuel from our county airport with a 250 gallon plastic tote bin in his truck bed. He then transferred that fuel to a tank at his airport. Not the safest thing I ever witnessed...but he did this on a routine basis.
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I am sure he had a hazmat endorsement and his tote was properly placarded .


For some reason the guys with the double pickup bed tanks always fuel up after the airport manager and ops go home. Probably just for convenience...
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
Don't look under your car and tap on the gas tank to see what it is made of.
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It's not made of the "unapproved for gasoline" poly IBC tanks depicted. Use of plastic tanks and non-metal hoses in fuel systems requires taking into consideration conductivity and other issues.
 
weilke said:
I am sure he had a hazmat endorsement and his tote was properly placarded .

Right !

For some reason the guys with the double pickup bed tanks always fuel up after the airport manager and ops go home. Probably just for convenience...
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Most fuel pumps are self serve pumps in my area, except at private airports.
 
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