LPG CONVERSION PROS AND CONS QUESTIONS.

Discussion in 'Mech Tech' started by Poptop2, Jun 22, 2013.

  1. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator


    Not entirely true para, efficiency can be measured in wear and tear too, wear and tear or smoother running is most definitely a bonus and can lead to better fuel consumption.
     
  2. For the hydrogen things, the numbers just don't add up. You don't get something for nothing, and the power needed to separate hydrogen out (if it's the same thing we're talking about) comes (indirectly) from burning more petrol. Put a heavier load on the alternator and it becomes more difficult to turn.

    Don't get energy for free - it's got to come from somewhere!
     
  3. Qualified Motor Engineer maybe? I don't know.
     
    Poptop2 likes this.
  4. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator


    Normally i agree but as the alternator usually creates excess power when the battery is charged then using that excess to agitate a jar of water is not wasted energy quite the opposite. in fact it is using the excess a bit like a dump load in a solar system.

    The load never increases as the only "H" going into the air filter is what is there in the jar, it cannot pull on the power supply to create more it just as to use what is there already, it takes very little energy to create lots of "H" !
     
  5.  
    snotty, zed and paradox like this.
  6. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator


    it is difficult to accept you can actually utilise the the excess( and it is very little excess needed ) but believe me you can, we created loads of hydrogen with a flat car battery recently, days and days of it, we could have kept it going for weeks but got bored and it was in the way of the van.

    What people should realise is hydrogen is easily created, the energy companys and others do not want people creating their own energy so constantly diss it. it is up to people to free think, unless of course they just want to be sheep!
     
  7. You get a safety certificate from an LPG installer. They'll check over your install, check manufacturers info on components (tanks/vaporisers have a date of manufacture etc). Generally make sure everything is safe and then charge you £60+ for the 20 minutes it took them to do that. They'll also check it for CO and HC on a gas analyser and may adjust it for you.
    I was told tanks should be replaced every 10 years (from date of manufacture) so check that if you're buying secondhand.
     
    Poptop2 likes this.
  8. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    Cheers Zeb :thumbsup:
     
  9. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    i don't want to get into the hydrogen thing for the van tbh, it's more about safety than efficiency and i think there is enough danger of fire in the engine bay without adding a extra rogue flammable to it. But--

    i have been into the idea of free Hydrogen for some time, a few years back me and an old professor mate decided to make a hydrogen powered central heating system for his remote house.

    Now you are all right you cannot get any energy without some form of trade off! in this case we bought a old 250w solar panel off fleabay and connected it up as a battery charger and ran two wires from that to a demi john of water, we tapped the hydrogen created with a rubber hose and heated a small 3/4 gallon water tank using a old fashioned gas ring with the tank suspended above it, we then tried to use the battery to run 12 volt water pump but could not generate enough power, so we bought another cheap solar panel and that one ran the pump, we then connected that to a radiator in his garage and he monitored the results. he found the battery's held the charge and ran the system for about an hour after dark, he could create hydrogen all night but couldn't run the pump for long.

    He bought more solar panels and better batterys and it runs all his downstairs rads now, he never put rads upstairs because he reckoned the pump would take too much from the battery so he insulated upstairs and it all works a treat.

    i very much over simplified this btw!

    Strangely enough we never did much about our little invention but lots of forward thinking type people are using a similar system to this all over the world now
     
    Majorhangover and Ermintrude like this.
  10. Zed

    Zed Gradually getting grumpier

    So you need a solar panel on your poptop instead of the alternator power and drive during the day, which is what we mostly do anyway?
    Even if you got another 1/4 mpg it would be amusing, but I shan't be bothering.
    Same for the gas conversion really, the more uptake, the more tax will be added until there's little or no difference. In the good old days diesel was cheaper than petrol and look what happened...
     
  11. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    All unfortunately true Ste!
     

  12. You got it wrong, hydrogen generation does not take very little power as you suggest - you even now imply that the water pump will take more power than hydrogen generator? what kind of water pump is that?? I call bullMarmite. just have a look here: guy is running hydrogen cell that requires 23A at 12v to generate 3Lpm of hydrogen. what you just said there doesn't compute.
     
  13. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    all i can say is it worked for us and is still working - thanks for the bull comment its always a pleasure being insulted online by a nobody!
     
  14. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    Could we just leave the hydrogen thing now as it seems to confuse people who read things online without actually trying anything themselves, i have heard all the denying before and you are of course all entirely correct and i know nothing, and i don't deny it!
     
  15. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator


    Thats it :thumbsup:
     
  16. Settle down, lads ;)...

    'Fraid "nobody"s correct: your alternator doesn't produce "excess" power, it generates electricity according to the load placed upon it. If there's no or little load (batt charged, no lights on), it'll produce little current. It's not like there's some left over. Given the inefficiencies of an alternator in converting mechanical energy from the engine together with the amount of power needed to liberate significant quatities of hydrogen, it just doesn't stack up.
     
  17. Poptop2

    Poptop2 Administrator

    8. Potential price hikes. LPG ( for vehicles ) is not tax-free but has a very low tax rate which is why it is so cheap. Cynics keep telling me that the government might suddenly tax the fuel to a point where it has no benefits, but there is a long term EU commitment to the low tax rate. This is a “green” issue – LPG exhaust emissions being much kinder to the environment than petrol exhaust emissions. Prices around Europe are not much different from the UK.

    This was the case with diesel tax until he became popular was it not- Europe was very cheap uk not so and then it became popular over here and it is now taxed heavily all over Europe too?
     

Share This Page