LPG for X7 diesel?

[osx]

Has anybody done this? Although getting 50mpg an LPG conversion will be a considerable saving as I probably do 20-30k/year. Will it affect the longevity of the engine (not had any problems and done 100k). Local garage will do this for around £1k. Can you use the spare tyre space for the tank?

[Michel]

LPG on a diesel car? No.

http://www.go-lpg.co.uk/diesel.html

[Gibbo2286]

Not all that good on petrol engines either, I recall Ford did a fleet of Transits running on LPG for British Gas, they were all in the motor auctions as non-runners before they were a year old.

[white exec]

GM seemed to have success with '90s Astra/Vectra dual-fuel (LPG-petrol) versions, but these were ex-factory, not conversions, iirc. Some of our engineers ran them, and to high mileages.

[Michel]

LPG is fine in a modern petrol/spark ignition engine. I had a Jeep with it for years. It was on 180k miles when I sold it.

[Homer]

GM seemed to have success with '90s Astra/Vectra dual-fuel (LPG-petrol) versions, but these were ex-factory, not conversions, iirc. Some of our engineers ran them, and to high mileages.

We had a dual fuel Astra foisted on us at work, ran terrible on LPG, camshaft eventually broke but IIRC that was a fairly common occurrence on petrol only models.

Availability of LPG was also an issue and it doesn't seem to have improved.

[van ordinaire]

A-f-a-i-k, you can't convert a diesel to LPG - although there was a system for injecting it as a mixer/booster - bit like nitrous, I s'pose.

We keep being told that more & more LPG pumps are being installed - what we're not told, is they are notoriously unreliable AND their maintenance/repairs service is abysmal.

One thing that is never mentioned is how slow LPG is to fill, paricularly when it is cold, & that while refueling you have to keep a hand on the start button on the pump, several times when fiiling the green Cherokee (120 litres) in the winter I though I might die of frostbite/exposure/boredom before I'd finished. The smile at the size of the bill couls be painfull!

If you live near/regularly pass anLPG site & you can get a vehicle ready converted (no more than 10 years ago, I'd suggest) then the higher your mileage/fuel consumption the more it makes sense. Unless your mileage is in the USS Enterprise league, it will never be worth paying for a conversion - & you'd just have all the disadvantages.

[moizeau]

Why has it disappeared?

[white exec]

It's popularity grew in the face of rising petrol prices, but the appearance (in the '90s especially) of quiet and powerful diesels and their much better fuel consumption - and fuel availability/price - put a damper on it. The environmental credentials of LPG simply got sidelined.

If you ran a real gas-guzzler (eg a V8 Winnebago), LPG made absolute sense - plenty of under-chassis room for the tanks (or a half-a-dozen full size propane cylinders, in the case of some hot-air ballooners), and the motivation for doing something about the 5-8mpg that Amercan engineering had bequeathed.

We had some friends who brought one of these big LPG campers from UK to Spain a few years ago. Came as a real shock to find there was no auto-gas available in Spain, so it spend its time on petrol, or on campsites. When you drove it, owner Andy swore you could hear the €50 notes sucking in through the air cleaner!

[moizeau]

I got my Saab 900 carb 8v that my Grandad left me, converted to LPG. It did 20 mpg at 30 or 90 mph, no difference, with the price of LPG it brought into lines with the BX19rd, cost wise, but what a car (I still have it) That was in 1998 ish. It was supposedly good for the environment? Then it has become less available as years have gone by. It did give another breath of fresh air to the Landy V8's.