OK, so there was a truck fire on the SF-Oakland bridge today:
(for those who care)
in which the fire threatened the <= 130-gallons of fuel on the truck.
130 Gallons? isn’t the really small? I remember travelling by night (when the only others on the road were state troopers and truckers) and re-fueling at truckstops wherein the really LONGHAUL rigs would stop.
I never asked about those big honking tanks then, so I’ll ask now - how much fuel can those monsters take on?
The largest capacity I ever had was 275 gallons on a Kenworth T600. However, I did meet a few people with 400 gallons of capacity on various brands of tractor. However, large capacities like that are often on trucks owned and operated by independent drivers. Also, in times of higher fuel prices or fuel scarcity, more capacity could be desirable. Even if the tanks will hold more, there is no requirement that they be topped off at each fueling.
Most trucking companies want their trucks, even those driven by owner-operators, to have smaller capacity. The reason is weight. One hundred gallons of diesel weighs about 650 pounds, which is a lot of weight when the useful load with a temperature controlled trailer might be 42,500 pounds.
It’s only my personal opinion, but twelve hours of fuel is about all I would have on a truck I would own and operate. Maybe a bit more in winter when weather threatens. Other drivers may rightfully think quite differently. Since the entire fuel capacity can’t be used without gunking up the fuel filters with slime, 130 gallons in the tanks sounds like a nice amount of fuel to have on board after fueling.
Again, this is just my personal opinion about max capacity.
My truck has 2 100 gallon tanks. I don’t like to let it get below 1/4 full (going by the gauge). I generally have to fill up every other day. My normal fill up is about 130 gallons and I’ll have traveled 800 miles since the last fill up.
As for the fire threatening to burn the 130 gallons of fuel, one might want to remember that diesel doesn’t burn the way gasoline does.
My KW had twin 125 gal. tanks ,and my volvo had 2 150 gal.tanks