Lpg Convertions? Any Idea Guys???

[quattrodude]

hey all iv recently baught my new found pride and joy a aby 1993 s2 coupe, i love the car its an amazing bit of kit and iv always wanted 1.

However with the world gone completley mad and fuel prices rising as stupid as they are i can see the s2 is going to be expensive orniment sat on my drive instead of showing all the chavs and divs on the roads wat a real car is.

so i enquired about a lpg convertion as its practicly half price running.
i had a lpg kit on a old vw camper i had and it was great but not so sure how the 5 cylinder turbo will react to gas.

Any ideas guys or has any 1 else using it alredy?

its a multi point direct injection system im looking at so it should completley replicate what the standard injectors do already.

any advice would be great
Cheers
Lukas

[Rusty]

Im sure if you go fo a high-end LPG system then you should get some good results. Based on the fact that LPG conversions are more for cruising about rather than racing everywhere you can just switch back to petrol for when you want a thrash. Perhaps disabling the WGFV with the LPG armed would help as it would limit boost to 0.5bar (assuming standard WG spring) and so should make things easier in the mapping department. When correctly setup LPG can give good results and I certainly don't see any problems.

too!

[sheppardnias]

I ran a 1.8 20V engine on LPG and it was not good.. Far less power, far less MPG, no boot space at all and I spent most of my time looking for the next LPG station despite having a 60 litre tank. Insurance companies were twitchy about insurance depite having the certificate from an approved installer and smaller companies walked away.

LPG does work well on simpler systems though and I would possiblr run it on a non turbo car in the future. Not sure running it on something like an S2 would be wise though. Plenty of potential for engine damage I suspect and fuel economy is likely to approach single figures from my experience. When I had mine 4 years ago LPG was just released into the air intake. Not adavnced at all and not something the engine really liked. I also struggled with the system continually going lean at idle despite being linked into the Lamda sensor and the ECU. When this happened their was always a backfire and an explosion in the air cleaner box. Initially this blew the air intake into pieces and eventually a sprung flap was fitted to release the pressure. Even so it sounded like a gun going off and scared the living s**t out of pedestrians as you crept upto crossings..

We ran my car, an old E220 and a Toyota Camry on LPG where I worked. All really lacked power on LPG and took massive drops in MPG. The merc did 17-18MPG and was slower than a push bike. The Toyota would slow down on hills if the aircon kicked in and did 24 mpg on gas. My 1.8 20V did 26mpg on gas compared to 36mpg on petrol. Performance was OK on a motorway but as soon as you hit the twisty stuff it was dull, on petrol it was a hoot.


Think carefully before jumping in...

You have to way up the fuel savings (having taken into account the drop in MPG) over the mileage you do against the hefty cost of getting the system fitted.

Unless you rack up something in the region of 15k miles a year, it generally does not make sense to go on LPG. Value of LPG converted cars tends to be the same or less than cars not converted. I suspect that an S2 on LPG would not increase in value but I could be wrong.

[Greg_S]

Having spoken to a few people about this in the past and with my dad who was an LPGA approved fitter he didnt recommend fitting LPG to the turbo engines because they arent advanced enough and you loose alot of the driveability. My old cavalier was brilliant on LPG but the S2 wouldnt really suit it.

[baltiboyS2]

They have overcome a lot of problem with LPG on turbos my friend had is S6 LPG converted and it ran not bad at all i did not really like it maybe because he did not use the firm i worked for to do it but went to edinburgh instead
I worked for the garage after my shifts and before as they were looking for a new mechanic and could not find any one decent so i filled in untill they got someone but we did a few scooby conversion as the boys were going through fuel quicker than it was going in and they ran really well as well infact ran great
But personally i would not fit gas i just prefer petrol in a engine designed for petrol

Cheers Raj

[quattrodude]

cheers guys
im not gona rush into anything just yet however the only system i am looking to ge fitted is the multi point injection and by rights its almost exactly the same as the petrol system as it injects gas into each pot.
i had my 2.0 8v camper converted and that ran spot on as that was only using a 1.8 single point injection system.
iv heard may a story about the gas backfiring and distroying the inlet and airboxs and thats why i think only the muti point would work but im gona go see a few fitters and get some ideas and il keep you all informed how i get on.
Lukas

[sheppardnias]

Will be interested to hear how you get on with this. I was so keen on gas until I had it but was then so dissapointed. If you go down the route I'd love to know how the S2 runs on the stuff.

[mine4ever]

Although this thread has been here for quite some time, I still want to insert my thoughts. It's true that this information about LPG will be very useful and helpful. It's a great help to be knowledgeable about LPG concerns. However, it will be wise to look into reputable companies that offer conversion kits for your quick solution.

Cryogenic

[prj]

Spamvertising...

Btw on topic - do not run LPG on your turbocharged car without a separate remap, which is switched the moment you start using LPG.
You need to advance timing lots, but no kit does that, and that leads to very high EGT's on turbocharged cars.

Here are a few pics after 200 000 km on 1.8T with LPG:

http://img864.imageshack.us/img864/9493/valve1.jpg

http://img36.imageshack.us/img36/5084/valve2o.jpg

http://img821.imageshack.us/img821/1530/valve3.jpg