Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Shop Talk Petroliana Forums General Petroliana Discussion How do Fry stops work?

I was wondering how the Fry stops work that are in the body of a Fry Mae West? What is the purpose of the stops? I just was wondering how they work? Thanks

If the customer only wanted 3 gallons [cause he only had 50 cents in his pocket], the handle would be set @ 3 gallon notch. Top of overfill tube will be @ 3 gallons, you could pump all day & never have more than 3gal. in cylinder.

Another way to look at it is, that after a sale, the attendent filled the cylinder, say up to the 10 gallon marker. The next customer came in and said he wanted only 5 gallons. The attendent would lower the stop, in this case a tube that was inside the cylinder. It would be lowered to the 5 gallong position, and any gasoline that was above the tube would run through the tube back into the ground, thus leaving 5 gallons in the cylinder. The attendent would then release the valve and the remaiing five gallons would run down the hose into the gas tank. This is why this type of gas pump only used what we call a bananna nozzle. It was just an open nozzle, with no means of controling the amount of gasoline flowing through it.

This type of measuring gasoline replaced what was known a eye measure where the attendent would lower the amount of gas down from the 10 gallon marker to the five gallon marker by watching the gas lower it self in the cylinder. Not too many people thought this was the most accurate way of doing thing.

One of the best examples of a pump with stops is the Correct Measure pump we call the pipe organ pump. It had tubes for just about any amount of measusre desired. Incidentally the same person who designed and patented the Fry 17-117 also designed the Correct Measure pipe organ pump. Mr. Mackenzie.

I wrote a two part story for CTO back in the Spring of 2009 about these pumps.

Jack Sim

I like the pipe organ and am very anxious to get mine back together and see it spin.