Ok, I initially thought that using toy tanks on houseboats was pretty straightforward...apparently that's not the case because everyone I talk to seems to have a different interpretation of how they work. And my personal experience with ours has been a bit of a mystery. I need help with the math and logic from you who are more experienced to make sense of this. With no DR, the gas budgeting stakes are much higher these days. Here is the fact pattern:
700 gallon total gas capacity on our HB
470 gallon advertised toy tank
only one gas gauge at the helm
2 ski boats (65 gal capacity each)
2 waverunners (17 gal capacity each)
All vessels are full of fuel from Page gas stations at the start of the trip
SImple Question #1: Is the toy tank and the tank for the HB motors/generators the same physical tank?
Simple Question #2: Do I have unconditional access to 470 gallons of gas in the toy tank that the HB motor/generators can't and won't touch?
Mysterious Question #3: How in the world do you make sense of what happened the last two seasons on 6 day trips???
Using the toy tanks, we filled up each ski boat 3 times, we filled up each waverunner 4 times, we drove the HB to Rock Creek and back from APM, we ran one generator approx 75% of the time, the gas gauge in HB showed completely empty when we got back to APM, and yet APM gave me a receipt for 550 gallons of gas to fill the HB back up at the end of the trip (we were billed 580 total gallons the previous year so it has been consistent)?????
How does this happen with a 700 gallon total fuel capacity? How did we use 500 gallons of the toy tank yet we supposedly only used about 50 gallons to drive the HB to Rock Creek and back and to run the HB generator for a week. Scratching my head.
[BTW...this is obviously not a cost effective trip going through that much fuel and it will be extra painful this year--thankfully it is spread over several families]
Anyway, it seems like we have overused the toy tank capacity (which I thought was limited yet we never ran out), underused the motor/generator capacity, and have been duped by a single HB gas gauge that I can't make any sense of. If we truly use 550 of a 700 gallon total capacity, the HB gas gauge certainly shouldn't be on empty or very close to it.
Can anyone help me out with how these tanks work and how this math works? I hate guessing each year and leaving things up to chance.
700 gallon total gas capacity on our HB
470 gallon advertised toy tank
only one gas gauge at the helm
2 ski boats (65 gal capacity each)
2 waverunners (17 gal capacity each)
All vessels are full of fuel from Page gas stations at the start of the trip
SImple Question #1: Is the toy tank and the tank for the HB motors/generators the same physical tank?
Simple Question #2: Do I have unconditional access to 470 gallons of gas in the toy tank that the HB motor/generators can't and won't touch?
Mysterious Question #3: How in the world do you make sense of what happened the last two seasons on 6 day trips???
Using the toy tanks, we filled up each ski boat 3 times, we filled up each waverunner 4 times, we drove the HB to Rock Creek and back from APM, we ran one generator approx 75% of the time, the gas gauge in HB showed completely empty when we got back to APM, and yet APM gave me a receipt for 550 gallons of gas to fill the HB back up at the end of the trip (we were billed 580 total gallons the previous year so it has been consistent)?????
How does this happen with a 700 gallon total fuel capacity? How did we use 500 gallons of the toy tank yet we supposedly only used about 50 gallons to drive the HB to Rock Creek and back and to run the HB generator for a week. Scratching my head.
[BTW...this is obviously not a cost effective trip going through that much fuel and it will be extra painful this year--thankfully it is spread over several families]
Anyway, it seems like we have overused the toy tank capacity (which I thought was limited yet we never ran out), underused the motor/generator capacity, and have been duped by a single HB gas gauge that I can't make any sense of. If we truly use 550 of a 700 gallon total capacity, the HB gas gauge certainly shouldn't be on empty or very close to it.
Can anyone help me out with how these tanks work and how this math works? I hate guessing each year and leaving things up to chance.