Any machinery requires proper maintenance and upkeep, this is true of everything from your car to your home computer. The same is true of your home and its various components, including heating, HVAC, and their associated systems. Just as you monitor your car to make sure that it doesn’t run low on oil you should do the same with your home heating oil.
How Can I Check If My Oil Tank Is Low?
You can check your oil tank gauge. Much like your car, it will give you a percentage (i.e., 40% full) as opposed to telling you how many gallons you have left. To continue the automotive analogy, you can also check your oil with a gauge stick or “dipstick” – a process familiar to most drivers.
How Do You Tell If You’ve Run Out of Heating Oil?
The obvious sign that your heating oil has run dry is the dropping temperatures in your home or your heat switching off unexpectedly. If this happens it could mean you’re out of oil, or it could be indicative of an issue with your furnace.
Check the tank gauge and make a visual inspection by removing the cap and shining a light inside. If you don’t see liquid oil, you have probably run dry. You also have the potential of having pulled sludge from the bottom of the tank into your furnace, which can wreak havoc. Also be on the lookout for strange sounds coming from your furnace.
How Long Should Heating Oil Last?
That depends on the size of your tank. If you have a modest one-bedroom house, the tank is probably about 300 gallons. The average furnace will usually burn between 0.8 and 1.7 gallons per hour on average. If your furnace gets 10 hours of use each day, you’ll need a refill once every seventeen days.
What Happens If Your Tank Runs Out of Heating Oil?
Our various comparisons to cars notwithstanding, running out of heating oil will not immediately damage your tank. With a car it can cause significant damage in a number of ways, but this is where our comparison does not hold.
Keep in mind that leaving your tank empty can cause long term damage as condensation forms on the empty interior walls of the tank. This causes rust to form, which not only damages the tank itself but also flakes off getting into the system’s pipes.
Of course, the immediate fallout of an empty tank is the fact that you’ll be going without heat.
How Low Can I Let My Oil Tank Get?
If you’re using a dipstick, roughly four inches is the marker. This is where most systems have their outgoing feed lines to your furnace. If your oil levels get down to that point, then your furnace will almost certainly cease working.
Tragar Automatic Oil Delivery Provides Peace of Mind
You have enough to keep track of. Let Tragar Home Services make one thing easier through its automatic oil delivery service. We offer home heating oil at great prices in addition to the more environmentally friendly Bioheat®. Family-owned Tragar has been servicing Long Island homeowners for more than 60 years, so you know you’ll be in good hands. To learn more about prices or which fuel option is right for you, contact us today.
