Anybody know what airspace I need in a cylindrical dry sump tank to hold 4 litres of oil??

I have guessed a litre (plus a 300ml breather/oil seperator can on top of the tank as well)

Is this ok?

cheers

Nat

1 gallon is 6" x 14 3/4".
adam

.........Back to the question!!

I could do with knowing the AIR SPACE above the oil, needed to stop it blowing it all out down the breather pipe.

I know you need a fair bit of air space but not how much works

Tank will be 5" diameter, but that is largely irrelevant.

[Edited on 10/1/08 by NS Dev]

soz read the question wrong .
adam

no worries, sorry for being a bit sharp!

From memory, 1/3 air 2/3 oil with a fine mesh to assist in seperation. Oil comes in at an angle so it swirls againts the side of the can

About a third or a bit less of the total capacity. With only 4 litres of oil you need to be careful when the engine is cold as this small volume of oil can get 'hung up' in the engine when thick and sticky, leaving your pump sucking some air. It pays to look at improving drain-back to the sump where you can (extra drains from the head area etc). A Hayabusa will hold 2.5 litres of oil in the head area when cold for example!

Yikes!!

Hadn't thought of that!

I am using aprilia RSV mille vee twins and they are dry sumped as std, so I was basing oil volume on what they contain as std. I might add a bit for safety then!!

I couldn't just base the airspace on the mille setup as the tank is a funny shape being on a bike!

cheers

Nat

Ps Phil, that would explain why the radical with hayabusa engine had such a vast tank, always wondered why it needed to be so big!

Nat,
Are you doing anything clever with respect to air/oil separation in your tank? I have an RSV Mille tank on the shelf in the garage and it doesn't look particularly big so, as I won't be using it, I might do a little surgery and see how it's done inside.
Cheers
Richard

errrr, you don't fancy selling it do you rich??

i am seriously running out of time and given another std tank very cheap, I'm tempted to just run the std tanks!!

let me know!

cheers

Nat

ps I was going to use a tangential return with a piece of stainless perforated sheet welded into the path of the oil being returned, on the inside wall of the tank.