I should give up on trying to determine how much propane we need. Back in June, 2022, I wrote this:
We have a 500 gallon propane tank. They will only fill it 80% full so basically, we have a 400 gallon propane tank. There’s a minimum of 200 gallons to buy to get the lowest price. Our take was at 50% so I calculated it all in my head and that was 200 gallons. They came yesterday to put propane in the tank. Vince came in and said “How did you figure we needed 200 gallons? We only needed 150 gallons.” Lucky for me, they still gave us the lowest price.
We still have the same 500 gallon tank and it’s been two years since we filled it. In Texas, we had gas heat, gas water heater, gas dryer and the gas stove/oven. We were filling the propane tanks (we had a 250 tank and a 500 gallon tank for the house and a 250 gallon tank for the greenhouse). Even with 750 gallon capacity, which I guess they still would only fill the 250 gallon tank to 180 gallons (or something like that) and the 500 gallon tank to 400 gallons, it seems like we were filling those tanks several times each year. So, here, not getting the tank filled at least a year makes me nervous. I know . . it’s not a matter of time but a matter of how much propane is left in the tank.
We have a gas heater in the basement garage. It’s the same heater we had in the greenhouse in Texas. When the plumber came here and plumbed for the gas stove in the basement, he installed the gas heater too. That’s mainly to keep water pipes from freezing and, not likely needed but to keep the humans from freezing too I suppose. We do have gas fireplaces on the main level and in the basement. They’re great for ambiance but not so great for heating. There is an electric fan that blows the heat out and if the power was out, we could pop the front panel off the fireplaces, plug the fan into a battery and run those fireplaces but, our plan has always been to close off the upstairs, open the door from the garage to the basement and run the propane heater in the garage. That would be plenty of heat to keep us – maybe not comfortable but alive.
So, going into winter with a propane tank half empty makes me nervous. I did all the calculating in my head. Our tank was 52% full. No go! It needs to be 40% full before they’ll come out. I was very nice but I managed to convince the lady that I was concerned about going into winter with a half full tank and told her that our backup heat is propane and gave her my best “help me out here” speech and she agreed they could “bend the rules”.
They came yesterday to fill the tank. I was so sure it would need close to 200 gallons. Nope – 104 gallons. I’ve done a lot of canning on this tank, mostly trying to make room in the freezer. I doubt I’ll be canning so much ever again so my guess, barring some crazy circumstances were we have to rely on the propane heaters, is that by the time there’s another Presidential election, 2028, we’ll be getting another propane refill.
Karen Langseth says
With modern day internet everywhere, we added something (can’t remember what its called) to our tank that will automatically notify our propane supplier that our tank is at 25% so they will come fill it automatically. It will be great not to have to keep checking it in the winter to make sure there is enough in the tank.
judy.blog@gmail.com says
We can get that too but I keep a close watch on our tank and even with the gizmo, I’d still be checking it. I don’t ever let ours get below the minimum amount they require. Obviously, I’m always doing it too soon but they’ve been very nice about filling it and not charging extra because we didn’t meet the minimum. Really, I’m sure it will be four years before we need to get it filled again.
Sheila Meyer says
If you ever need to know again the % left in the tank is figured on the full capacity of the tank which is 500. A 500 gallon tank at 50% would have 250 gallons left so to fill to 80% would take 150 gallons . I worked for a propane company for 30 plus years . Hope this makes sense ! Have a good day !
judy.blog@gmail.com says
All I can say for sure is that I had 52% left in the tank and they only put in 104 gallons which doesn’t add up for me. I’m just going to oblige them and get down to 40% next time and make them happy. But, thank you very much for the info.