A simple question regarding on board propane tanks.

[jonthebru]

I just had to replace a 40 lb propane tank for my rental. How are installed tanks on older RVs dealt with? I would imagine it would be a fairly big job with a fairly high price. My point is that if someone buys an older RV and its tank can't be refilled, it would have to be replaced or substituted. Any stories?

 

[Blue]

well... depends on how big of tanks you want, 40lb tank is pretty huge, and expensive. 2lb tank on the otherhand dirt cheap. if I was re-vamping an older RV with giant propane tanks... I think I would retrofit it to carry a bunch of cheaper smaller tanks connected together instead.

 

[Lucky mike]

portable tanks must be inspected .(any tank designed to be re-movavable and portable).......the permanent mounted tanks are not required to be inspected ,they are considered to be part of the motor vehicle and fall under another law......you could have a 50 year old perma- mount and as long as it doesnt leak or get damaged its good!!

 

[jonthebru]

portable tanks must be inspected .(any tank designed to be re-movavable and portable).......the permanent mounted tanks are not required to be inspected ,they are considered to be part of the motor vehicle and fall under another law......you could have a 50 year old perma- mount and as long as it doesnt leak or get damaged its good!!

Thats what I was wondering because there are a lot of used RVs out there that are more than 10 years old and there has been no discussion of the propane tanks as far as I have seen.

 

[BamaDuke]

I've seen this discussed before. A propane "Tank" is a permanently mounted unit, such as on an RV. A propane "Cylinder" is what you use for a BBQ grill, and what you swap out at Kroger. Tanks have no re-inspection required by date. A cylinder must be re-inspected (hydro-tested) at certain intervals, usually 10 years. A Tank is inspected at every fill, by the filling guy, for excessive rust and/or pitting, bad valves or bleeders, and whether or not the mounting hardware is good. If the filling guy sees a problem, he can refuse to fill the tank, but he can't refuse to fill a "tank" on grounds of age. More than a few filling stations have been cited for refusing to fill a tank when there was no legal reason to do so. It ain't cheap.

Replacement tanks are available, and they aren't as expensive as you would think. Or at least as I would have thought.

Bama