ASME Propane Tank, Repair Mount or Replace Tank?

[CoachStreamr]

One of the two mounts for our Coach's Propane Tank (16" x 42" ~26lb) has a crack. Tank is almost 22 years old. Should I try to fix the crack or is it a must to replace the tank which is basically a ~$1250 job ($850 + freight + remove/install/test labor). The tank # is still current and available in IN.

The two shops I checked with don't want to drop it and weld/fix the crack.. replace is what they say. Checking one more shop.

It doesn't even look like Manchester (the tank Manufacturer) even welds both full sides of the mount to the tank, front half on one side, rear half on the the other side.

What about JB Weld on the mount's crack?, has anyone used that on their coach for a repair?






.

[sjholt]

If that were my tank i would have no problem with welding that up as it is not on the tank.
What caused that is those mounting bolts were placed too far from that bend allowing it to flex causing the crack.
I'd also gusset it too.
Loosen those two bolts up and drop the tank down and grind out the crack some and use some 6011 rod to weld it up or mig it up..heck I'd weld it to the upper bracket and stop the flexing!
JMHO.

Skip H.

[CoachStreamr]

well, I thought this would be a straightforward fix (except I don't know what gusset, 6011 rod and mig it up means??). Cummins has been very fair to me on the other maintenance / other repair stuff but their techs don't want to repair/weld/fix the the tank, another weld shop/rv shop with great reviews will not repair either.

Of course, Cummins' Priority is the Commercial Truckers and they are busy, they work on many RV's but the truckers get Priority and that is endless so maybe they just don't want to do it.

The 2nd shop that I contacted about this is a RV shop / Trailer Hitch Welder, long time in the community, same thing, will not repair wants to replace.

Manchester won't sell direct, didn't think they would, however I now have three quotes here in Washington for the tank/freight and was the same to the cent for all three (same dist?). I have a company so I contacted one of the distributors for Manchester and bs'd some, found out the wholesale and it's close to clearing ~$400 on the tank alone.. just seems excessive though I know it's very very low volume.

[Soppy]

Forget JB weld . It won't hold up on that. I would find someone to weld it. You could also put a piece of angle iron on the opposite side. Just bolt it to the tank mount and then the frame.

[CoachStreamr]

Originally Posted by Soppy

You could also put a piece of angle iron on the opposite side. Just bolt it to the tank mount and then the frame.

didn't think of this.. interesting option that I will look into

drill two holes in tank mount vertical (thru existing tank mount vertical) and two holes on top through chassis rail.

EDIT: get a angle iron (like "L" bracket - 90 degrees) for placement on opposite side of upper mount bolts and drill two holes up top, two in vertical of mount - 4 bolts total? Do you think that will do it?

I also see Angle Iron is available in 0.125", 0.25" thickness etc., 1"x1", 1.5"x1.5" etc.. any suggestions on what to use?

[Murf2u]

It doesn't matter what you do, until you figured out and solve what cracked it in the first place, any repair you do will just crack again exactly the same way

[Soppy]

.25 should work good. Go as big as you can 1.5x1.5 or 2x2. You may have to do some trimming to get it to follow the tank contour.

[CoachStreamr]

Wanted to note, a few messaged me on here and said to contact a mobile welder who would have (probably) done the repair.

We did land up getting the tank replaced (with another but new Manchester 6845) and the original dual regulators to one single high capacity regulator split to the two systems. The bay had some rust inhibiting paint after the old tank was removed, looks great.

It seems the new tank had a little different design on those mounts with some added support

I'll be posting pictures of the new tank's installation soon.

.

[CoachStreamr]

New Tank pics - I should have had them treat that regulator mount bracket with rust inhibiting paint.





.

[Pirate]

How much did that new tank cost you?

[CoachStreamr]

Originally Posted by Pirate

How much did that new tank cost you?

Probably the retail. The tank was $847 plus $145 freight plus tax.

Installation, a new Regulator and other was in the $400 range. I did have them paint the bay with the old tank out with rust inhibiting paint. They also did the proper new tank purge and pressure/leak test.

I had called several places and the ones that could even order it had it at the same price. Others including Camping World could not even special order it. I tried to negotiate the tank price a bit but no one would budge with this special order item. There was an eBay seller that had the tank in the $500 range but he seemed sketchy with emails exchanged. He would not provide a picture of the tank that would be shipping and could not tell me the tank's manufacture date.

My tank was shipped directly from Manchester.

.

[Mr_D]

Well the tank was installed by the RV manufacturer so no wonder Cummins wouldn't weld it.

[CoachStreamr]

Originally Posted by Mr_D

Well the tank was installed by the RV manufacturer so no wonder Cummins wouldn't weld it.

I also called 2 welding shops here in town and 2 smaller RV Repair Shops and all said the same thing (liability). I landed up ordering the new tank from one of those 2 smaller RV Repair shops (Northwest Coach), happened to be a couple blocks down the road from Cummins - they had great reviews and Cummins had good things to say about them.

Cummins will work on all the Chassis things and would have replaced the tank for me if I brought them a new one - they could not even special order that tank. Freightliner Northwest could not order that tank.

.

[Bazzer]

I would have flushed the tank and welded the brackets myself with a small MIG welder, just a few minutes job. Removing the tank and cleaning the brackets would have taken most of the time. The actual weld would be done in a couple of minutes.