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| XRFan101 |
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Thats all well and true but most people should know that they need to run thier car on petrol in the morning so that the fuel system etc doesnt seize up if they are going to use LPG all the time.
Taxis do it everyday, so thats what i do and look at how much they rack up the kms, without major engine overhauls too.
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
Don't forget that taxi's are pretty much run constantly therefore removing a large portion of the start up wear.
A car that a normal person would use for commuting to and from work etc. is subject to much greater wear, and it is during the initial 10-15 minutes of warming up that a large portion of the wear occurs. If you were to start and run the car for the first 10-15 mins on petrol it would probably help considerably, but then unless you travel long distances to and from work each day it kind of makes the LPG pointless. |
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
The other thing that I forgot to add is that you need to add the cost of the backfiring and blowing something apart occaisionally to the overall cost.
From my experience no shop can stop this from happening - even some of the highly regarded LPG only shops that I tried. |
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| XRFan101 |
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Yeah okay the back firing is a big problem, its happened to me twice now and it scared the s**t outta me both times. But i mean i have always started my car on petrol then changed it over to LPG after about 10mintues.
But yeah i can see where your coming from. 
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
I can also see the upside of LPG - but I thought that I would give some of the negatives of it aswell - which from my experience with LPG far outweight the positives.
In saying that I also have friends that swear by it and the first thing they do is convert when they buy a car. The last one that bought a new Ford went the LPG only option. |
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| twr7cx |
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mattronics wrote: The other thing that I forgot to add is that you need to add the cost of the backfiring and blowing something apart occaisionally to the overall cost.
From my experience no shop can stop this from happening - even some of the highly regarded LPG only shops that I tried. Every time my cars backfired it's been a problem with the ignition, old sparkies, damaged ignition, lead not connected properly leads or something like that. Easy fixed. As for damage from the backfire, it's destroyed two flexible tubes on the intake piping elbow. Went to hardware store, got a meters worth for $20, and have heaps of spare now, takes 5 minutes to replace, but generally the only thing that happens to my car from a backfire is the air filter box lid jumps up and I have to connected it down again with the spring clips. No biggie. |
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| XRFan101 |
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Hmm luckily thier hasnt been any damage from back firing with my XR. It makes a bloody big bang but doesnt seem to have an effect on the airbox and hoses etc.
 Lets hope it stays that way... But yeah i would also agree with that back firing has been mainly due to the ignition system. Plugs and leads prolly need to be replaced so im sure that would make alot of difference.
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
It sounds as though you have been fairly lucky with only the hose blowing apart.
Unfortunately I had a ZL and every few times it backfired it bent the air flap(MAF) in the airbox which resulted in a at the time $600 c/o part. After the 3rd replacement and many more backfires I pulled the LPG out and disposed of it - best thing I ever did. I had the car to quite a few "LPG specialists" in Vic. some very well know ones also and no-one could stop it from backfiring. |
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| twr7cx |
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mattronics wrote: It sounds as though you have been fairly lucky with only the hose blowing apart.
Unfortunately I had a ZL and every few times it backfired it bent the air flap(MAF) in the airbox which resulted in a at the time $600 c/o part. After the 3rd replacement and many more backfires I pulled the LPG out and disposed of it - best thing I ever did. I had the car to quite a few "LPG specialists" in Vic. some very well know ones also and no-one could stop it from backfiring. Well were comparing different cars and different technologies! Chunkz is asking about converting his EF, which is much closer situation to my EF than your ZL. I mean EF's don't have MAF's, and with spring clips on the airbox lid they should survive backfires pretty much unscathed! |
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
Yeah they are different technologies, but there is still the backfiring problem, it still happens doesn't matter what the age of the car is, I was just trying to point out that it is not always that cheap to repair. I am sure that more expensive things can be blown apart on an ef.
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| twr7cx |
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mattronics wrote: Yeah they are different technologies, but there is still the backfiring problem, it still happens doesn't matter what the age of the car is, I was just trying to point out that it is not always that cheap to repair. I am sure that more expensive things can be blown apart on an ef.
Not really, there's not a lot in the path of the back fire, which is the point I was trying to make by saying the cars are different and don't really compare. The most expensive thing that can be blown on my car by a back fire is the K&N air filter, and so far it's untouched! The EF I6's don't have a MAF or anything expensive like that in the path! The backfire if it's big enough will blow a hole into the flexable tube at the L corner of the intake piping, or if smaller will go round it and just pop the air box lid up and pop off the spring clips. I would never run a pod filter with LPG as that'd probably be wrecked. |
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| mattronics |
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Age: 46 Posts: 198 Joined: 3rd Mar 2005 Ride: NL FBT #079 Location: Melbourne - S.E. suburbs |
I realise that there isn't anthing in the way in an ef, but I know that in the early days of ef/el gas conversions they used to blow apart airbox lids, quite often. Obviously this is a much less common occurence now that they are fitting the spring type clips instead of the original locking type clips.
As I stated the other reason that I am against LPG is that it runs much drier therefore affecting upper cylinder lubrictaion. LPG cars also run a bit hotter and over the long term this will affect the valves and stem seals etc. |
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| tickford_6 |
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Posts: 6449 Joined: 11th Nov 2004 |
96ghia wrote: tickford_6 wrote: i wouldn't bother with gas at all.. in a few years it will cost the same as petrol. The excise doesn't change until 2011.. thats 7 years of fuel savings.... tickford_6 wrote: And because you use more gas then petrol to go the same distance it would end up costing more.i spose if you went duel you might in the next few years make up the cost of the intall in fuel savings but you will not be better off.. Plug the numbers into my spreadsheet http://www.fordmods.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11681 And see how they come out. Typically you'll use about 16L/100Km on gas if you do 13Km/100 on petrol (I think??) depending on how hard you drive. tickford_6 wrote: Then you will have a gas system with no use and no resale value.. Who says they have no re-sale value? Gas fitted cars (not ex-cabs of course!) of the EF/EL era, with all other things equal, (km, condition etc) era are going for the same price as petrol... and are more in demand now than ever with Petrol going up and up. Some people even buy old cab wrecks for the gas systems. the excise is being increased slowly over those 7 years and the cost of gas will go up with it. and when gas cost as much as petrol, gas cars will be avoided when people are shopping for second hand cars. who would want a system that use more fuel, makes less power and takes up boot space when the cost of both feuls will be the same. not to moention the extra weight you have carry around causing more economy to be lost. ad to that the cost of fitting the system the problems that come with it and with duel systems the compromise you have to make with the tune, it make gas an unatractive option. |
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| 96ghia |
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tickford_6 wrote: 96ghia wrote: tickford_6 wrote: i wouldn't bother with gas at all.. in a few years it will cost the same as petrol. The excise doesn't change until 2011.. thats 7 years of fuel savings.... tickford_6 wrote: And because you use more gas then petrol to go the same distance it would end up costing more.i spose if you went duel you might in the next few years make up the cost of the intall in fuel savings but you will not be better off.. Plug the numbers into my spreadsheet http://www.fordmods.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11681 And see how they come out. Typically you'll use about 16L/100Km on gas if you do 13Km/100 on petrol (I think??) depending on how hard you drive. tickford_6 wrote: Then you will have a gas system with no use and no resale value.. Who says they have no re-sale value? Gas fitted cars (not ex-cabs of course!) of the EF/EL era, with all other things equal, (km, condition etc) era are going for the same price as petrol... and are more in demand now than ever with Petrol going up and up. Some people even buy old cab wrecks for the gas systems. the excise is being increased slowly over those 7 years and the cost of gas will go up with it. and when gas cost as much as petrol, gas cars will be avoided when people are shopping for second hand cars. who would want a system that use more fuel, makes less power and takes up boot space when the cost of both feuls will be the same. not to moention the extra weight you have carry around causing more economy to be lost. ad to that the cost of fitting the system the problems that come with it and with duel systems the compromise you have to make with the tune, it make gas an unatractive option. But even when the full 11c is added, the max cost of Gas will still be around half or less than Petrol... the 11c will still not make that much difference in the grand scheme of things. As for dual fuel, just re-tune to run on gas, and don't use petrol! simple! The extra weight is around the same as one decent sized passenger. and if its fitted correctly you won't see any more issues on gas than you do on Petrol. As for Boot space, yes I don't like losing it either. which is why you can go for a non-boot tank setup on some cars. I'm not saying its for everyone, (Heck, I only do 12,500 ks per year, so it would take me ages to pay off) but for high km per year users, it makes great economic sense. Just remember that with ANY engine mod if dpone badly or dodgily will adversely affect the running life and well-being of the engine in question.... |
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| ef302 |
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The other thing to consider is the price of petrol. Do you honestly think it will go up by less than 11c in 7 years???? They are already predicting prices over $2 a litre by next year... Even if LPG doubles in price and then gets an 11c excise it will still be a s**t load cheaper than petrol. Besides you only need to do about 50,000 kms (about 2-2.5 years for most people) to pay off a conversion. As prices of fuel go through the roof, this distance will only decrease.
If, in 10 years or whatever (~200,000 kms) it is no longer cost effective, just take it out... You get the best of both worlds, cheap gas now and bigger boot then.. BTW - On the APS Dyno I get 100.3 rwKw on gas and a MASSIVE jump to 103 rwKw on petrol... so much for power loss
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