searching for buried oil tank
Hi, I’m buying a Brooklyn brownstone where there might be an oil tank buried in the front yard (for one thing, the place where oil would be poured has not been sealed off). The owner converted to gas years ago and says the tank was removed from the basement. But it’s possible that an old…
Hi,
I’m buying a Brooklyn brownstone where there might be an oil tank buried in the front yard (for one thing, the place where oil would be poured has not been sealed off). The owner converted to gas years ago and says the tank was removed from the basement. But it’s possible that an old tank had been buried in the yard years before and never removed. I want to be sure there’s not one buried because a leak can be really serious. I’ve heard that there is some kind of sonar to test whether there’s any buried tank without digging it up. Anyone know someone who does this work and how much it costs? I really don’t want to go through the expense and money of digging up the yard for no reason (and I don’t even own the property yet either so I’m not sure I could even do this if I wanted). Thanks!
I also know of plumbers that will attach a camera to the snake to see what’s out there for about $300 (we had to have this done to find tree roots in our sewer pipes). This would be really informative and could save you a lot of money/headches down the line if you have reason to be concerned. Maybe you could negotiate something like this with the seller.
Snake the pipe opening, see how far it goes. Put a off center weight onto clamp at cutter end. If you can get some distance in, spin the cable and it will clunk and make a racket. Put your ear to ground and it will be easy to hear the noise.
We locate septics and well heads that way here in the country.
bruce@jerseydata
Had a oil to gas conversion last year. It is code that the pipe must be cemented closed when the oil tank is taken out to prevent what previous poster mentioned about the 100 gallons in the basement! I think this is a fairly recent code, though. Something not right about the open fill pipe. Have you had the house inspected yet? Inspector might have some pointers as to what to look for or records to look up.
Dont take a buried tank lightly. We had a 1500 gallon oil tank buried in our backyard, and when we changed over to gas in 1970, no one ever thought, (or legally had), to do anything with the tank. I believe these days, if you have a buried tank and you convert to gas, you must have the tank drained and filled with sand, and have the filler pipe sealed up.
this link might be useful- I haven’t read whole thing yet
http://www.inspect-ny.com/oiltanks/tanks.htm
Everyone’s oil tank is in their basement so who would go to the considerable extra expense of having it buried in the yard? Seems counter-intuitive.
Not done this but perhaps try pouring a gallon or 2 of water into the pipe – go into the cellar and look for a puddle below some pipe coming from the wall. If you find the puddle, you’re probably fine. If you don’t, either the water is has no where to go (pipe outlet in cellar blocked) or there is a tank. If there isn’t a tank, the pipe should fill up quickly to the point you can’t pour more water n from outside…
I am guessiing the owner is correct. We removed our tank ni the cellar recently but did block up the hole outside with cement.
FYI one story I heard was of a house where the tank had been removed but the hole not blocked and pipe open into the cellar – the oil company mistakenly tried to fill the tank and filled the basement with 100s gallons of oil instead (mistaken address with neighbor or something)…