# Home Heating Oil Tank Questions



## dusty_shelf (Apr 14, 2021)

I am wanting to add exterior details to a ca. 1950 house/small business structure. When did the typical ovate home heating oil tank come into use? These are the ones usually seen along the side or at the rear of the building. What would be the appropriate roof venting look like for a home from this era heated with an oil furnace. I have had no luck finding period photos showing these details.

My family lived in a house with this setup. It would have been about 1965 when we moved there. I remember the tank outside and the big furnace inside. What I cannot determine is if this setup would have existed ca. 1950.

Thanks for any input.


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## MichaelE (Mar 7, 2018)

My grandmother had oil heating too, but the tank was in the basement accessible by a fill port in the foundation. House was from around 1950-1955.


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## dusty_shelf (Apr 14, 2021)

Do you recall the tank there in 1950-55 or is this the age of the house? My old house was built in the 1920s or so. I do not know when the furnace and tank, present in 1965, would have been installed.


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## Lehigh74 (Sep 25, 2015)

My house was built circa 1951 and has the original 275 gallon tank much like this one in the basement. Original roof vents were at the gable ends.


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## mesenteria (Oct 29, 2015)

I think it was a mistake when people placed such tanks outside of the home. Maybe it was a forced call for some reason, but condensation would be a problem. By the 50's, though, it was common knowledge that a bacterium was in the heating oil and would destroy the tank, if single-walled (almost all were) within a few years, at which oil would leak into the basement. The stench would linger for years. So, you lived with condensation and had to drain the filter a couple of times each season, or you kept the tank strictly topped up to avoid large volumes of moisture laden air inside the tank, or you placed it in the basement and hoped the leak, when it happened, would be minor and allow you to drain the remainder and to replace the tank. Double-walled tanks obviated the worry.

For vents, do you mean the furnace's vents, stacks for vacuum break, or tank's vent? Roof would have stack vents capped with lead collars to prevent rain incursion, and the furnace's stack would also vent through the roof. The vacuum break, through which condensation would possibly enter, went out the closest basement wall in my case.


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## MichaelE (Mar 7, 2018)

dusty_shelf said:


> Do you recall the tank there in 1950-55 or is this the age of the house? My old house was built in the 1920s or so. I do not know when the furnace and tank, present in 1965, would have been installed.


The tank was there in the 60's when I was growing up.


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## wvgca (Jan 21, 2013)

in my experience all heating oil tanks were inside, usually in the basement, to avoid freezing up of the contents. heating oil was virtually indistinct from number two diesel, in my area the diesel was dyed and a little ceaper. some of those tanks are still in use, dating back to the forties or sooner


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## dusty_shelf (Apr 14, 2021)

The home I speak of was in Michigan, on a lake. We and all our neighbors had tanks outside. The water table was such that there were no basements or subfloors to permit an inside tank. I had a friend who lived further from the water and on higher ground. They had an area dug out under their home where the tank was located.

I do remember the tank freezing and also being without fuel because the trucks could not get to our neighborhood due to snow-covered roads. We all slept in the living room and took turns stoking the fireplace with logs! Cutting firewood was a yearly ritual for us growing up.


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## gunrunnerjohn (Nov 10, 2010)

wvgca said:


> in my experience all heating oil tanks were inside, usually in the basement, to avoid freezing up of the contents. heating oil was virtually indistinct from number two diesel, in my area the diesel was dyed and a little ceaper. some of those tanks are still in use, dating back to the forties or sooner


Heating oil starts to wax at 16F, so it can be an issue way south of where you are if the tank is outside. I can identify with the stink of a leak, my first house had oil heat and that made me never want it again! I had three houses with heatpumps and finally we have gas heat here.


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## Lemonhawk (Sep 24, 2013)

The stream in front of where I lived in Indiana one day turned a phosphorescent green. Called the county and they showed up rather quickly. The guy took one look and knew what the problem was and started walking up stream until he found the offending diesel tank dumped in the stream. The tank owner immediately removed the tank so I don't think he got fined. It was a shocking green and obviously not normal.


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## tiger (Dec 16, 2015)

Data point, my 1949 house had one behind the house when we moved in back in 1983 so I suspect appropriate for an early 1950's structure.



wvgca said:


> in my experience all heating oil tanks were inside, usually in the basement, to avoid freezing up of the contents.


+1!!! Or at least I WISHED they were all indoors. My first Christmas as both a homeowner and a newlywed, woke up to 42F in the house, no heat. Nosing around, no idea what to do. Neighbor came over, said I likely had ice in the tank outside the house, had me aiming a hair dryer at the oil line leading to the house while he disconnected the line from the bottom of the tank and poked with an ice pick up into the bottom of the tank. Chunks of ice came out, reattached the line while oil gushed out, had heat in minutes.

I assure you that by the following winter I had gas heat!


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## Lemonhawk (Sep 24, 2013)

When I was a youngin we had coal furnaces, but between two housed that had coal we had an oil heated house - it was by far the best heat of all! The last house with a coal furnace had a "stoker" so with my small half handled gravel shovel I could fill up the stoker and it would run for the day. 70 years later I still have that shovel! Its been with me for the past 5 moves.


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