Propane

[Turbo-Rich]

Anyone have any thoughts on using propane gas on a carb'd TR
It's rated @ 98 octane, burns REAL clean in the engine & is a lot colder of a fuel than gasoline. Not to mention it's pressurized & doesn't require a fuel pump.
I grew up working for a mechanic that used it on most of his vehicles & he was head mech. over a school bus garage. All the busses (350 Cheb's w/q-jets mostly) ran on propane too so I was around it quite a bit. I must say that I was most impressed with how clean it burned. When we rebuilt an engine that had ran most of it's life on propane it looked as clean as a new engine inside. Almost no carbon build up at all. Usually the engines would just plain wear out it's tolorences after many years & many miles(usually over 200,000).
I'm thinking with it being cooler & higher octane that we could run more boost w/less knock easier than with gasoline.
I'm not sure how it would act w/our cars ECM's tho?
Any idea's or thoughts? I'm just being hypothetical really, tho I can easily get my hands on the stuff to add the propane.
I do know that some states have laws against pass. cars running propane but that's besides the point.
I would also think that since our cars are draw-thru & tend to coke up in the turbo the propane would keep things nice & fresh. On Tonyas 83 T the turbo was so coked up when we first got it we thought it was going to be toast. Sometimes it would spool & sometimes it wouldn't. After a good soaking & cleaning it turned out to in good shape.
For anyone who's not familiar w/how to run propane, it's basically just a propane tank w/a hose run straight to a bonnet that fits on top of the carb & an on/off switch somewhere in the lenth of hose for switching back & forth from gas to propane. The carb's butterfies control the amount of propane that enters the motor. It's real simple!
What do you guys think

 

[1badTTA]

just wondering about hte expence of getting a tank that would be safe/legal to run in a car, also how is it metered?
great idea to play around with, just how much would it cost?

 

[b4black]

I just read that Ak Miller Enterprises in California used to run propane/turbo set ups. That was back in the 80's.

Check this out
http://www.truckworld.com/4x4-OffRoad/96-1957TurboWillys/1957TurboWillys.html

 

[unboostedV6]

Propane injection has been used on diesels as a combustion enhancer for years. As far as legality goes, any DOT container is fine as long as it is securely mounted, and most of your basic barbeque tanks are DOT approved...just look for the letters "DOT" stamped on the collar. No special license is required to transport any hazardous materials totalling less than 1000 pounds.
- your authority on compressed gas transport - GB

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Nice propane conversion site,



http://www.wps.com/LPG/LPG-book-final.html

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Originally posted by Turbo-Rich
It's rated @ 98 octane

I believe you can get it rated at 110 octane also

 

[cooper]

I have no idea about the technical aspects, but I spent some time in Japan when I was in the service, and all of their taxis ran on propane.

They were Toyotas (of course), and as I remember, they had some pep to them. This was back in the late 80s

 

[ITSAV6]

An old issue of Turbo magazine had a TT 300Z that they converted to propane and it added 100hp or so due to cooler charge,higher octane and ability to run more boost due to previous two! I dont remember the issue but it was in the late 80's to early 90's. Might could search the site and find it.

 

[Ttype83]

OK time to talk about this again. Have be reading a thread at a import site that is using propane injection like the deisel trucks. It seems to be working, you get some cooling affect and higher octane like alky (C5 propane rated @ 117) Now if we can fine a reasonable priced setup....

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Good timing Jim!
I've been getting some good answers about running propane in a draw thru club I'm in.
I'm seriously considering using it as a secondary fuel system.

Where are those import guys getting 117 oct I believe it depends on where you live as to what oct. rating is avaliable. I hope we can get the "good stuff" down here!
I'm trying to find a book called "Propane Engine Conversions" by
Jay Storer. I've had more than one person reccomend it to me.
Here's a website with plenty of info. on conversions.
http://www.wps.com/LPG/
They used to sell this as a booklet but now it's on the net for free
I haven't had time to read it all yet tho
I'll post more later when I can get some time.

 

[1badTTA]

I was wondering if Propane could be used in an NOS setup with Alky instead of gas and Nitrous?
Injected as a liquid it would have the same effects as NOS and also be a high octane fuel and inject Alky in the same NOS nozzle.

Talk about a 7th injector from HELL!!!

 

[Ttype83]

Originally posted by 1badTTA
I was wondering if Propane could be used in an NOS setup with Alky instead of gas and Nitrous?
Injected as a liquid it would have the same effects as NOS and also be a high octane fuel and inject Alky in the same NOS nozzle.

Talk about a 7th injector from HELL!!!

Yes that is what I'm talking about..propane comes out a gas @ -60 deg. You use a fogger nozzle on a NOS setup.
I wouldn't inject Alky & propane at the same time thou...

 

[pat83t]

What about hooking it up to a hobbs switch to kick in when you reach a certain amount of boost to kick in to cool the air/fuel mixture. kinda like an alky kit. I am seriously looking into this now. oh well more money into the pit. So about how much is it going to kill me? guess I have to find somebody around here that specializes in propane conversions.

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Originally posted by 1badTTA
I was wondering if Propane could be used in an NOS setup with Alky instead of gas and Nitrous?
Injected as a liquid it would have the same effects as NOS and also be a high octane fuel and inject Alky in the same NOS nozzle.

Talk about a 7th injector from HELL!!!

I asked pretty much the same question in another club & here's the response I got.....

"but this
approach won't work. Here's why. A gasoline engine mixes the proper
amount of gasoline with the air as it goes into the cylinder. If you
add propane to this 'intake charge', as it's called, the propane gas
displaces the air and starves the engine for oxygen. The result of
adding even a little bit of propane is that the engine will run way too
rich, make lower power, foul the plugs, and generally piss you off.
You can switch an engine to propane from gas and from gas to propane,
but in general you can't mix the two fuels (no danger of an explosion
AFAIK.)

OTOH, a typical diesel engine meters the fuel based soley according to
throttle position (new diesels use computers to control injection, but
we can ignore that for this discussion.) Air is not throttled on a
diesel like it is on a gasoline engine, so a diesel is free to ingest
as much air as possible on each intake stroke, irrespective of how much
fuel is called for by the throttle. Because of this lack of an "air
throttle" on a diesel, turbocharged diesels often run with more air in
the cylinder than the fuel needs to burn, so there is the potential to
make more power by adding more fuel - and that's where propane comes
in.

Propane is sometimes added to turbocharged diesels to make more power
than the same engine will on diesel fuel alone. That's because a turbo
can pump more air than the fuel pump can pump diesel. That air is free
to burn with more fuel. But the diesel pump is already delivering as
much fuel as it can. So mechanics add propane systems as cheap and
easily added extra fuel. A boost-sensor switch is usually used to turn
on the propane gas under high boost situations. And the more boost
pressure, the more propane is delivered...

These systems can work well on a diesel, but usually won't work on a
gasoline engine, because the gasoline engine's carb or EFI is already
delivering the full amount of gasoline. The only situation where I can
foresee that it would work is where your turbo is making enough boost
that it overpowers the carb or EFI and starts to lean out the engine.
This is a very tricky situation, though, as it take only a few seconds
of running lean with gasoline to melt a hole right through a piston...
;("

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Originally posted by Ttype83

I wouldn't inject Alky & propane at the same time thou...

Actually I'm finding out it's quite common to run alky injection along with propane when you are running propane as main sourse of fue(vaporized, not injected)l. It's true that propane is cold in it's liquid state but vaporized (I just found out) it is very dry & hot & alky injection can be important even on a n/a motor.

 

[Turbo-Rich]

Propane & an I.C.

I can't take credit for this one but seeing how LP is a vaporized gas it might be possible to run an I.C. on a D.T. set up because you wouldn't have to worry about fuel puddling like with gassoline.
I know it's a far fetched idea but it does provoke a wealth of new thought though.
I've been playing around with a kinda far out design for a 231 T.T./dual carb/ D.T. project(twin T3's). The biggest draw back so far looks like it would be the turbo to intake runner lenth. This just might be a good place to slide in an I.C.?
When I get my car more stripped down like I want (no a/c/no powermaster/no smog equip.) it & have maxed out the fact. system, I hope to play around with a set up something like this.