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Sealing seams in steel hydraulic tank

M

Mtjohnso

Member
I welded up a steel tank 1 ft x 1ft x 2ft to use as a hydraulic tank on a small project. Unfortunately I am not a professional welder like you see on some of you tube channels. So I have a tank that will hold together but when you put some air pressure on it and some soap and water on the seams you find a bunch of pin hole leaks.
I have tried rewelding some of the spots but still have leaks.
I am just using a flux core wire feed. Have welder set for the right speed and amperage according to the chart on the welder.
So I have done some searching online and in local stores for a seam sealant that I could pour in the tank and Coat the seams on the inside.
The tank again will hold hydraulic fluid.
So has anyone used a home brew recipe or commercial product that is not too expensive to seal seams on a tank?
 
appears thats your last resort, so you need to see a rad shop or such shop that does tank relining. pretty sure it will be more than if a professional welder would have done the welding. OR you would have to grind all that weld flat and have a welder go to it. depending on tank thickness it can also be done with an arc welder also, as in 3/16. good welders can also arc weld 1/8 stuff quite easily.
 
Look up Red Kote or Por 15 those are pour in tank sealers. The thing I might be concerned about in this case is how the heat of the welding affected the surfaces near the joints on the inside of the tank. Hopefully the fill hole is large enough to look in and see. Concerned that there may be flaking that would affect how long the sealer would work. Maybe you could put some small hardware in it to slide or swoosh around to help clean up the areas.
 
I agree with keep grinding out the leaks and welding them up.

A gas wire welder, or even a stick welder will be better than a flux core.

Grind down deep into the weld below the impurities that caused the porous welds. Keep after it, it's not as hard as it looks, BTDT.

I would be very skeptical of using sealer. It might stop the leaks temporarily, but no guarantee it won't eventually flake off and clog the suction strainer and contaminate the system. It would be near impossible to get all of it out causing ongoing problems.
 
Use an angle grinder and make all corners square again (time is all it takes). Then mark each leak and reweld. Your intended solution is like having an easy to fix, thick walled tank and patching it like a thin walled used rusty tank. Make its future bright. Jim
 
Or, if you have an acetylene torch just melt a pool at each pinhole, and keep testing. I welded up one of my FEL supports as a reservoir, and I chased pinholes for hours, grinding and rewelding. But I may have gotten them all - it held 25 psi overnight when I was done. I did use the TIG eventually on a couple of stubborn spots. Don't try to reweld pinholes with pressure in the tank.
 
Short answer is no. All of the "tank coating" products are temporary solutions at best, disasters at worst, and headaches looking for a place to happen.

Reason being is preparation is everything and you can't prepare the inside of the tank properly so that the product will stay stuck. Your tank has scale, schmoo, and all sorts of contaminants in the surface of the metal that you can't get rid of just by shaking a little muriatic acid around inside.
 
I dont get why everyone is down on tank sealer. There is some really good stuff out there. I get sealer from Snyders antique auto parts in quart cans, it looks just like milk. It will leak through a pin hole but not for long. And, unless you built the tank out of rusty garbage, there is no reason that there should be any complicated prepping of the tank. However, you cannot weld AFTER you coat the tank, the sealer will ignite and explode. So make sure you have all the tabs and nipples installed before you coat the tank.
 
Some of us guys at work 48 years ago when i welded did a test on welds. We made a 4x4 cube out of mild steel. We welded fittings in it to pressure test it for leaks. Half of the seems were welded with a wire welder using CO2 gas and then the other half using argon. All of the CO2 seems leaked a small amount testing with soapy water. Argon never leaked.Your mileage may vary.
 
Do you know how to braze, or know someone that does? Mark the spots, clean them and braze them closed, end of problem. Or oxy/acety. gas weld them.
 
I have had luck sealing MC fuel tanks by heating the leaking are with a small propane or map gas torch and applying green sleeve retainer locktite to the offending area.Works good on pinholes. Don't knock it till you try it. Worked surprisingly well.
 
Your first mistake was to use flux cored gasless wire to weld anything. I have been welding for over 50 years and I wouldn't have a roll of that crap in my shop for anything. I have never seen anyone make an acceptable weld with it. If I were to try and fix the mess I would probably take a brazing tip and try to flow it all together without using any filler rod or I would use 6010 electrode and try to work the slag inclusions out of it. Good luck. You may need to start over.
 
I would be hesitant of a sealer flaking off and stopping up filters, relief valves and such. Do you know of anyone that could run over it with a stick welder ?
 
By any chance are you trying to weld the pinholes with pressure still in the tank?

I recall trying to weld a leaky tank on a log splitter once, (oil still in the tank, but laid on its side) and the pinhole would blow open every time the weld cooled. I am guessing that the heat increased the air pressure in the tank and the only way it could vent was through the hole.

What finally worked was to heat the area with a torch for a few minutes, then weld the hole up.

Yes, I was using a flux core welder because that is all I had.
 
Making small repairs with wire feed is tricky, because the weld starts out cold and doesn't really fuse well until a second or so after you start welding. That's why it's not used much for critical welds like aircraft tubing. Preheating the material can help, but at this point you have a bunch of porous welds. If you have an oxyacetylene torch, you might try gas welding, as you can control the heat better with gas than with wire feed. Brazing is another alternative.
 
not answering your question re sealant which should be ok too ... all the above can work. even the flux core works. go slow and add a quick spot on the edge of the pin hole, let cool, clean, spot again til the area is complete. if the hole is small enough you can often plug it in one shot. if you can get a light inside the tank it can help to spot holes. the flux and errant wire can lodge on the inside which may or may not be a problem. yes gas shielding is better. seams can have contaminants buried in them. brazing works well in so many conditions. tig works wonders. if there's a field of pinholes, cover with welded patch or cut out and fit a patch.

This post was edited by rio4000 on 03/06/2022 at 08:43 am.
 
Nothing wrong with flux-core. Grind the pinholes. Start a little away from the pinhole and continue past the pinhole. You may need to vary speed and heat higher or lower than what your chart says. Takes practice. Flux-core is not the same as gas shield.
 
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