Electronic Seal System to Prevent Unauthorized Fuel Siphoning from Road Tanks

One of the main problems experienced by the companies dealing with long-range shipments of oil/petroleum products by road is "illegal use of the tank contents", or speaking plainly, in-transit fuel theft.

To address this pressing problem, the designers at Prompribor have developed the electronic seal system for road tanks to prevent unauthorized siphoning of fuel from the road tanks, while maintaining an ongoing account of events that occur to both the vehicle and the shipped product during transport.
Fig. 1 shows the system operating principle and its layout:

Once the road tank loading operation has been complete with the bottom and check valves closed by the specially programmed proximity card, an authorized person will perform electronic sealing (enabling security alarms) of all road tank compartments by bringing his card closer to the card reader aerial and pressing the keys to enter the PIN-code.

Meanwhile the controller starts performing the following functions:

• records current time;
• controls the bottom and check valves status;
• displays the message about security alarms enabled according to their index number;
• shuts off solenoid-operated valve of the pneumatic control unit;
• records all potential events (power off, disable security alerts, initiate the valve open sensors) with indication of event time.

Once the road tank has arrived to the destination point and prior to disabling security alerts, an authorized person will perform checks using his proximity card and PIN-code based on the display readings for the compartments status while disabling security alarms to start the product drain cycle from the compartments.

Temperature printer or notebook can be used for documenting the process of enabling/disabling security locking.

In addition, there is an option of plugging the GPS and GSM modules into the controller to enable tracking the road tank location, supervising the security locking/unlocking directly from the office, and enabling data transmission about unauthorized opening of compartments, the compartment product grades, amounts and security mode disturbances.

When using the electronic seal system, it should be kept in mind that each road tank compartment has to be equipped with the following items:

• blank cap with the level limit pneumatic and electronic transducers and air-operated breather;
• bottom valve with electronic valve open indicator;
• check valve with electronic valve open indicator.
Road tanks have to be equipped with such items as:
• pneumatic control unit with solenoid-operated pneumatic valve to be steered only by the road tank controller;
• battery powered electronic controller to perform compartment protection functions;
• electronic seal control panel;
• bottom and check valves with flap position indicators.

The offered electronic sealing system may be of interest to managers and engineers of the oil and oil product shipping companies, and may also encourage the state authorities to enact regulations aimed at tightening the requirements set to the special-purpose vehicles for shipping highly flammable and explosive liquids. 

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