Electrical for Dummies: Gas Caddy Ground in Bed

Hi all,

I have one of those steel 30 gallon gasoline caddies (like this:https://www.handyindustries.com/gc-30-gas-caddy) and I will be filling it up in my 3rd gen tacoma bed since lifting it into the bed full of gas at 300 lbs would be a pain. The gas caddy comes with a 3 foot long ground wire with an alligator clamp to eliminate hazards from a spark.

Question: where in the bed is the best place for me to connect this ground wire? There are the bed bolts on the floor of the bed but it's hard to get the clamp to connect to those. The other bare metal u-shaped tie down points towards the front of the bed (see pic) are probably just connected to the bed, but the bed is composite, not metal right? Any pointers?

Thanks!

 

the only bolts that connect to the frame, and not the nonconductive composite bed material are the bed bolts on the floor. I would move the bed bolt near the rear of the bed, the one with the tiedown loop, and switch it with one near the front.

 

Check with Handy but I think the ground lead should connect to the fuel pump ground when filling the caddy. That is the way it was done when we filled drums with race fuel. There was a ground lead at the pump that connected to the drum. Your truck doesn't have a good ground since it is sitting on rubber tires. Your 3' cable sounds a little short though. Don't take this lightly. I saw a 5 gallon gas can explode that was being filled while sitting in the bed of a truck.

 

I have that same unit (except bought mine from Amazon), actually 2 of them. Mine was about $250 except it came rusty inside.

I complained to the vendor and they let me keep the old tank and sent me another. It was also rusty so they gave up and give me a refund.
I used electrolysis to derust both tanks, and then coated them with POR-15.

About the ground strap, that is critical during fueling and defueling operations. The fuel hose at the fuel pump (for normal gas stations) is electrically conductive. Before filling the tank from the gas station, make sure to touch the gas station hose to the tank to discharge any charge and keep the nozzle in contact with the metal tank during filling.

The critical thing is during fueling of your items using the tank. Their provided hose may not be electrically conductive, therefore you need to ground the tank to your motorcycle, jetski, motorcycle before pumping to be safe. 3 ft isnt enough to do that, but that is why they provided it.

I use one tank for avgas and one for ethanol free. Here are the tanks before repairing.

I use a ceiling mounted 120v winch with the tanks. Strap is permanently wrapped around tank as a sling. Load empty tank into truck and strap into place. Drive to gas station and fill up. Drive home and hook up winch and lift up tank. Drive truck out from under tank. Lower tank and disconnect winch from tank. I included a water block filter on my installation, to make sure i dont pump rust or crap into my vehicles.

Let me know if you want any more info on my setup...

 

Awesome, thanks for all the info! Super helpful. So if I got that right, when you're filling it up in your truck bed, you dont connect the ground wire to anything? You only connect that wire to the thing you're filling up?

 

You connect the ground wire to the ground for the fuel pump that you're pumping from.

 

A couple more pics

Tank after derusting, it instantly flashes over with surface rust during the rinsing process, before starting the POR-15.


A pic of tank after coating with fuel inside, POR-15 is silvery


A pic of the ceiling hoist, there is heavy reinforcements above the ceiling.



A pic of the straps I use for lifting

 

^^ This. Otherwise.....

 

Roger that. yep just went to the gas station and my local Valero had a little ground tab at the base of the pump. Thanks guys