20 replies to this topic

[JeepGirl]

So we were sitting around the table after dinner talking about how good the truck was running and how cheap it is to run on propane... Even though it has a 454.

So I was asked: "What would it take to convert the Honda to propane?"

I had no reply......

I know the truck went in for engine work the day it was bought to be converted to propane, hardened parts galore internally... But that was Back back back in the day. 1978....

What would I need to do to the car to convert it?

I already have a decent sized tank... ... ... The blue one... ... ...


Propane is CHEAP!!! The big truck with the 454 costs as much as the Jeep with the 4.2L I6 to run...

Imagine a 1.3L on propane


I most likely won't do it.. but it was a thought... I am curious...

[badpenny]

Your carb hat that you made for the honali, with the cai, and a port with a tube inserted into it to feed the propane gas. Electric fuel pump, electric valve for the propane, and a switch, to toggle between the two, if you decide to keep both systems. Thats basically it. Because you are carb'd its much simpler. FI takes a bit of sealing the system and tricking the ecu into thinking nothings wrong.

BTW, how much cheaper is it for propane?

[alexm86]

BTW, how much cheaper is it for propane?

T. Boone Pickens said it was about $1.20 a gallon right now IIRC in his testimony before Congress recently. He said it goes up in the winter months b/c of winter heating demand but is still under $2 a gallon. Propane is about 110 octane and runs leaner than gas-about 15:1 I think. I almost put a propane kit on my civic way back in 1995 when I first went turbo. Ak Miller, co-founder of the NHRA/Hall of Fame racer/Turbo pioneer, did propane conversions and put a propane system on a 300zx driven by Steve Millen and they won their class in Pikes Peak that year. He also made my first turbo exhaust manifold. They did a few conversions for Integra's in SoCal back in the day. They made an adapter plate and mounted the carb in front of the throttle body and put a "carb hat" on top of the carb. It is not that hard to convert a fuel injected motor to propane.

Ak Miller and his buddies made OHG (Over the Hill Gang) propane carbs. I think they are still made. The carbs were about 2 barrel 450fcm or so each. They probably have many more sizes now.

[deadpool7372]

I have been Googling for weeks on how to convert a fuel injected motor to propane. I want to convert my '96 Dodge Caravan becouse propane is so much cheeper and I'm about to have to get in there and do work anyways. !!! But I cant find any good info! ...So I'll be watching here!

[firstgencrx]

Because the octane rating is so high on propane, you can get back a lot of the lost efficiency by upping your compression ratio. I say mill the crap out of that head and get an adjustable cam gear to correct the timing change.

Just my two cents.

David

[JeepGirl]

For sure!

If you find ANYTHING out about this topic by all means post it here!

I'm off to go to google hell looking for conversions kits... and ways I can do it cheaper :BLUSHES:

[JeepGirl]

So I was searching around.... Got to thinking.. "What about all those propane forklifts?!?!?!?" Lots of parts and I could mix`n`match to fit my engine size! Seeing as there are many types and sizes of forklift..... I could source most of the other parts I'd need from right down the block at my last place of employment!

Whatchya think?

*EDIT*
Current prices as of the 29th.. I'm in Edmonton.
Link

Propane is CHEAP!

[zakats]

So I was searching around.... Got to thinking.. "What about all those propane forklifts?!?!?!?" Lots of parts and I could mix`n`match to fit my engine size! Seeing as there are many types and sizes of forklift..... I could source most of the other parts I'd need from right down the block at my last place of employment!

Whatchya think?

I was just about to say that.
I'd find two or so fork lift carbs... get the diameter of each barrel and calculate the area of each barrel to be comparable to the stock's. it would be a very good idea to have a wideband o2 sensor to see how rich/lean it runs. also a compression bump would help like firstgenrex said. I'd say 11:1 at least

[3gcivicsi]

i was about to suggest forklifts aswell, i dont know many details but i do know that they are carbed and run off of propane. we have about 7 lifts at my job and they are mitsubishis, toyotas and nissans. pretty straight forward, ive actually been curious about running propane aswell. i recently found out that the truck that delivers propane at the yard actually runs off of propane too... im curious to see what the power difference would be...

[firstgencrx]

I was just about to say that.
I'd find two or so fork lift carbs... get the diameter of each barrel and calculate the area of each barrel to be comparable to the stock's. it would be a very good idea to have a wideband o2 sensor to see how rich/lean it runs. also a compression bump would help like firstgenrex said. I'd say 11:1 at least

I had a friend convert his Triumph TR7 over to propane. He loved it. He did raise his compression to 14:1. I thought it seemed high, but he was the one who told me about the super high octane rating of the fuel and that compression ratios as high as 17:1 could be used.

He said the energy density was only about 2/3rds that of gasoline, so you needed to burn more fuel to get the same amount of power. He said on lower compression engines, the efficiency was hurt, but by boosting comp, you can regain a lot of that loss.

Remember, you will not get as many miles per gallon (I guess it would be liters per kilometer for you) but the price is so much cheaper, you are still ahead.

Here are some links I found doing a quick search for "Propane Carburetors" on Google:
http://www.propaneca...m/examples.html

Even Holley carburetors used to make propane units:
http://www.cars.raso...pane-Holley.htm

Ebay has Propane Carburetors:
http://search.ebay.c...f...&category0=

Take care,

David

[zakats]

that holley 2bbl looks like it'd fit on a carb'd EW manifold nicely



edit: ok so ~12:1 (teg pistons in an ew3) would work well with a turbo application then! this would make for a cheap and easy drawl through turbo setup! AND you could still intercool it!!

saweet! who wants to buy my Bswap car?

[F20A2-T]

Here in The Netherlands alot of cars get converted to LPG.
Now a days with prices going to € 1.65 per liter (± $9.00 per gallon) a lot of cars converted to LPG G3.

Most of them are converted with Prins VSI (Vapour injection) or Vialle LPI (full liquid injection)
We have two trucks @ work (Dodge Ram 1500's) with the first system.
You can't notice if they're running on fuel or LPG.
The only thing is they use more fuel. That's why they use 220 liter ( ± 55 gallon) LPG tanks.

For carbe'd applications you can't use these systems or you could use Megasquirt to run the LPG.

Carbe'd cars here in Europe use a machined aluminium ring that goes in the airfilter or the hose between airfilter and carb.
Some of them even drill jets straight into the carb just above the throttle plates.
Also there are some "spacers" that go between the carb and manifold.
They connect a vacuum hose to the LPG converter to regulate the amount of flow of LPG to the engine.

Hope this helps a bit...

[alexm86]

I just remembered that Chip Foose built a car with a Big Block Chevy that ran on LPG. I think some Australian company made a electronic fuel injection type of system for it that did away with the carbs. I think they built it for SEMA. The car made a TON of power.

If I was going to put together a system for a 3G/1G, I would take out the stock fuel tank and cut out the spare tire well (cover it with sheet metal) and stick the tank under there so that the tank was outside of the passenger compartment. Used tanks should not cost that much. IDK if you can run two smaller tanks somehow instead of one big one like the one in the truck be above. Some company makes round ones (like a spare tire) but I am sure it costs $$$.

Nobody really mentioned it, but the propane regulator/converter acts like a regular fuel pressure regulator, but you hook up a coolant line to it to warm up the LPG so that it turns to a gaseous state. I am pretty sure the rest of the system is just the tank and fuel lines (+ carb-pretty much like a standard carb system). IDK if fork lift carbs are big enough for EW/D15A's.

[itjstagame]

I just remembered that Chip Foose built a car with a Big Block Chevy that ran on LPG. I think some Australian company made a electronic fuel injection type of system for it that did away with the carbs. I think they built it for SEMA. The car made a TON of power.

If I was going to put together a system for a 3G/1G, I would take out the stock fuel tank and cut out the spare tire well (cover it with sheet metal) and stick the tank under there so that the tank was outside of the passenger compartment. Used tanks should not cost that much. IDK if you can run two smaller tanks somehow instead of one big one like the one in the truck be above. Some company makes round ones (like a spare tire) but I am sure it costs $$$.

Nobody really mentioned it, but the propane regulator/converter acts like a regular fuel pressure regulator, but you hook up a coolant line to it to warm up the LPG so that it turns to a gaseous state. I am pretty sure the rest of the system is just the tank and fuel lines (+ carb-pretty much like a standard carb system). IDK if fork lift carbs are big enough for EW/D15A's.

I have been wanting to do this for sometime myself as well, but whenever I have looked the regulator/converter seems way over priced to me. Plus how does it know exact demand and rate needed? The ones I had seen use TPS and stuff, but if one just uses vaccuum from carb/manifold that'd be even better.

I'm very curious to see what you find.

[zakats]

I have been wanting to do this for sometime myself as well, but whenever I have looked the regulator/converter seems way over priced to me. Plus how does it know exact demand and rate needed? The ones I had seen use TPS and stuff, but if one just uses vaccuum from carb/manifold that'd be even better.

I'm very curious to see what you find.

really? brand new, impco carburetors go for 200-350ish last I checked and used carbs can be found on ebay which propane carbs don't really fudge up like gasoline's, just replace the diaphragms iirc is all a rebuild is