jerry cans

Hello Stephen and Deborah,
I have done some extensive exploring of really remote areas on abandoned and active Stations and Crown land in rough country, and due to extensive fuel requirements I have played with jerry cans in the extreme way... I personally own about 50 right now in four different types..

Now while that seems crazy, I had some left in remote places, even buried in sand at the base of cliffs and such, to use on a later date rather than hauling it back and forth... I have gone on week long trips off the bitumen, past where the logging and forrestry tracks and Station access tracks ended, in search of a few legendary places that disappeared long ago like the "Lost City" cave complex and the "Skeleton Creek" mountain access road that disappeared about fifty years ago except by horseback... I routinely carried 5 all the time, and often more, up to 20... That and goat hunting (now gone) and other remote access that made it nice to leave fuel at for future trips... etcetera... (Yes the "Lone Ranger" is crazy- ) I only outgrew the use of these jerry cans when I went to the 200 ltr drums... And 370 ltr long range tanks on my Mack... On my stretched Landcruiser in the 90's I took the 200 ltr drums, and black is better than blue for all the reasons below.....

Having said that, I still have now about a dozen steel, about 20 military black plastic, and about 20 of the normal K-Mart sort of Rheem Jerry can in half vented and half early ones that are non vented.. Now I do not know if there is any 100%convention on colours, but without a doubt black is best. First of all light tranmission on the blue polyethylene makes algae grow even in water... I have given away my blue ones. It aids in the growth of algae in diesel... Black is best, high carbon polyethylene has kept diesel good with chemical preservatives, for five years... Just burned some 200ltrs this year from about 1999 (Pickled with the long term storage chemicals). I would not use blue or yellow for diesel.... Blue for water maybe, and I have, but it does grow funk... British Military water cans are black, for all those reasons... I got mine from Disposal stores... I don't like the steel ones for anything, they rust, and any water that pools in them from condensation will collect sulfer out of the old diesel and turns into H2SO4 mild sulphuric acid and rusts and eats out the steel ones... They also rattle and chaff and rust... Black plasic Polyethylene Rheem type drums are the best in my overall experience... And I have gone on more extreme expeditions than most, both here, Africa, and North and Central Americas for all kinds of reasons... My choice is black, and marked for diesel or water or 25:1 chainsaw mix...

Cheers from the Last Ranger