3 ms·
The particular failure mode you're talking about is reasonably easy to reliably remove: all fuel piping should be under lower than atmospheric pressure. You acc
by robryk 9y ago
The particular failure mode you're talking about is reasonably easy to reliably remove: all fuel piping should be under lower than atmospheric pressure. You accomplish this by installing suction pumps next to consumers (and install additional pumps if the height difference is too large). That way, if a pipe breaks (except for the short pieces of pipe between the pipe and consumer), there will be no sustained fuel leak.
- Johnny555 9y agoBuilding constraints don't always make it that easy -- the generator could be below the tank level, so siphon action can still siphon the tank empty, or it can be a few floors about the tank, too high to suck fuel from the tank so it has to be pushed up from below.
- robryk 9y ago> the generator could be below the tank level This is what anti-siphon valves are used to prevent: they are valves that open only when sufficient suction is present in the fuel line leaving the tank. Thus, when the line breaks or the pump fails, the valve will close. > or it can be a few floors about the tank, too high to suck fuel from the tank so it has to be pushed up from below. True, it has to be pushed up then. Alas, you can have a sequence of suction pumps. Note that otherwise you'd need to have high-pressure fuel piping, which might cause more problems than the possibility of feeding a fire indefinitely.
- robocat 9y agoSo now the system fails due to frothy diesel. Or due to failures of the additional pumps (adding mechanical complexity to a system often decreases overall reliability)
- robryk 9y agoYes. This is a tradeoff between a chance of catastrophic failure (fire fed by fuel from the storage tank) and "normal" failure.