too much weight?

[marco 14]

I'm thinking of buying a van for washing.Would a decent size tank be to much weight for the van?how many gallons would I be able to get away with without making it a lowrider?I'm not looking to buy a box truck.Any info. would be appreciated.THANK YOU in advance

[810F250 14]

What type of van are we talking about 1/2, 3/4, or 1 tonne. I can be done but as with everything there would be a limiting factor, in this case the max GVW of the vehicle. What size of tank you were thinking, remember water ways about 8.33lbs per gallon.

[rsweeper 14]

Water weighs apx 8 1/2 lbs per gal. so every 100 gal is apx 850 lbs. so you can figure what weight you would want to carry. Also anything over about 300 gal you want baffles so the water wont slosh to much

[marco 14]

I would like to get a heavy duty van maybe the 1 ton ? is a 100 gallon tank average for smaller jobs?

[rsweeper 14]

I would say a 150 gal tank as a min and the you need to fill as you wash to keep it filled

[810F250 14]

I would like to get a heavy duty van maybe the 1 ton ? is a 100 gallon tank average for smaller jobs?

Depends.....Like Ed suggest bigger has its advantages,..... if you have a 150 tank capacity, you can fill it to 100 gals but you cant fill 100 gal tank to 150 gal.

What gpm machine are you using?

What type of washing will you be doing?

Does most of your jobs have available water supply?

[acegot 14]

Years ago I had a setup in a 1ton ford supervan(extended length). Hose reels at the back doors, then hot water skid crossways, 125-150 gal. tank cross ways, remainder, surface cleaner etc. Van handled it no problem, sat level. You could switch the tank & machine around too with no problem. I had it the way I did, cause with no water in tank, van rode better with the machine weight further back. Hope this info helps. Lyle

Edited January 26, 2011 by acegot
added

[Paul Kassander 26]

If you have water on site and you are using less than 6 gpm a 50 gallon tank is adequate. You may want to consider 100-150 though if you run into situations where water is not easily available.

[Douglas Hicks 128]

I used to use a plastic 55 gallon barrer. Cheap and easy to add the float valve, and the outlet piping. Now I use a small 20 gallon tank mounted on a stand that allows plenty of fall to the pump and to the drain. My cost less than $100.00 from an RV place.

[marco 14]

Depends.....Like Ed suggest bigger has its advantages,..... if you have a 150 tank capacity, you can fill it to 100 gals but you cant fill 100 gal tank to 150 gal.

What gpm machine are you using?

What type of washing will you be doing?

Does most of your jobs have available water supply?

4.2 gpm mi-t-m

mostly residential

most of the houses should have water supplies

THANKS!

[810F250 14]

Years ago I had a setup in a 1ton ford supervan(extended length). Hose reels at the back doors, then hot water skid crossways, 125-150 gal. tank cross ways, remainder, surface cleaner etc. Van handled it no problem, sat level. You could switch the tank & machine around too with no problem. I had it the way I did, cause with no water in tank, van rode better with the machine weight further back. Hope this info helps. Lyle

Sounds nice any pics?

If you have water on site and you are using less than 6 gpm a 50 gallon tank is adequate. You may want to consider 100-150 though if you run into situations where water is not easily available.

True Paul , its high flow pw's and some commercial sites is where I have had problems.

I used to use a plastic 55 gallon barrer. Cheap and easy to add the float valve, and the outlet piping. Now I use a small 20 gallon tank mounted on a stand that allows plenty of fall to the pump and to the drain. My cost less than $100.00 from an RV place.

It would get the job done. Nice idea

4.2 gpm mi-t-m

mostly residential

most of the houses should have water supplies

THANKS!

Is that 4.2 gpm a hot water?,,,, just attempting to figure the weight of the unit and the space it may occupy in the van.

Its not the houses that have water its the ones that have but the outdoor spigot cannot keep up. But I think you should be fine most times, but if you have the bigger tank and the space , when you get the commercial jobs you would not have to re-arrange the van immediately.

story/experience: went to do a residential and turned on the spigot for about 3 to 5 seconds had good pressure and flow, bleed the fill hose of air saw water exit the hose before connecting directly to the cold unit , started the machine and within seconds the pw pump sucked all the water out of 75 feet of 3/4" fill hose, I was at the end of the wand thinking "what the" .....;

...there was no water in spigot, it was the residual pressure in the house lines that flowed initially and somewhat filled the inlet line. After that incident the "cat 5cp" had seven lives left

Edited January 26, 2011 by 810F250

[Jerry 24]

a Short story..

I drove a SuperBee in high school.. ..What a ride !

..Then Honda came out with the ATC.. and fell in love with OFF-roading..

I got a Chevy minitruck, put a 250hp water-injected V-6 in it,

..and race-buddies showed me "suspension"..

High-speed rated, 6-ply tires, a little oversize too.. helps with load-capacity and SAFETY.

Then I wanted it to "perform with a load on it's back"..

I took it to a "springs-specialist".. (the Truck-Bodies biz and Off-Roaders know these guys !)

I told 'em .. "make it handle like it's empty, with 700lb in the bed."

He added 3 medium-duty leaf-springs, I added Gas-Charged and over-sized shocks,

and stainless-Steel torsion-bars in the front, and WOW ! that truck was fun.

That was the most stable vehicle I had ever driven, especially fast.

and I drove it a hard 200k miles without breaking it.

Your don't need (nor want) to "jack-up" a Mule..

Tell the spring-man "only one more inch up, with average load" on its back,

and what it will need to manage in Max load.. (..aka Full of water.)

Our service center will not install larger than a 220gl tank in a 3/4 ton van.

We use 3/8" hardened eye-bolts,

and we recommend "truck-rated" tires

..6 ply rated.

nuf said ..on that.

Here's a system we did for drain-jetting.. 150gl tank and 23hp blaster wasn't much to handle on this kind of van..

another note on the ATC..

In 1973 I coated that frame with "rust converter' ..the stuff sold by Gemplers..

I still have that ATC on it's original frame, and yes, I have ridden it at the beach.

For cheap Rust-Proofing-coating on steel ANYthing.. RustConverter is AMAZing !

Edited February 2, 2011 by Jerry
sp. & link & image

[810F250 14]

Good point on suspension "beef" Jerry, I have put the timbrems on truck to help resist squat

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

I'm thinking of buying a van for washing.Would a decent size tank be to much weight for the van?how many gallons would I be able to get away with without making it a lowrider?I'm not looking to buy a box truck.Any info. would be appreciated.THANK YOU in advance

Look into Sprinter Vans.

We have two. The first one holds a hydotek 2 gun hotwater unit and a square 150 gallon tank and a 3-stack of hose reels.

Plenty of room to spare and weight capacity is 3800 gvw.

the pw'er weighs in at around 700lbs

the tank when full is around 1200lbs

the hose reels I would guess when full of water weigh 400 lbs.

The van holds it all well and doesn't squat. Drives well on the road and handles the load with an mercedes benz 5cyl turbo diesel and gets 17-18 mpg/hwy.

Rod!~

[Paul Kassander 26]

Remember, it's not just the suspension its also the brakes and axles. I have snapped an axle before on a cab over that I had. It was weird I couldn't figure out what happened at first, everything was moving but the truck. More importantly if you can't stop all the suspension in the world isn't going to help you.

[810F250 14]

Remember, it's not just the suspension its also the brakes and axles. I have snapped an axle before on a cab over that I had. It was weird I couldn't figure out what happened at first, everything was moving but the truck. More importantly if you can't stop all the suspension in the world isn't going to help you.

True that, i use cryo rotors and race pads, same axel however, i agree you have to look at the bigger pic.