Straight Petrol, Straight Gas or Dual Fuel?

[MKPatrolGuy]

The vehicle is my MK Patrol LWB fitted with a SBC. It has a gas system fitted but not connected since the motor swap.

It is not a daily driver and mainly used for day trips that are fairly local.

I'm debating whether to keep it straight petrol with the quaddy and fit the long range fuel tank I have here and suffer the fuel cost.

Or go straight gas, possibly using the stuff CRUSHU has for sale, and pulling the petrol tank and fitting a gas tank in its place along with the existing tank inside. It would have approx 160-180 litres of usable gas.

Or fitting the long range tank and getting the gas hooked up and running dual fuel and living with the compromise.

The longest trip this vehicle will do is drives up to Mt Skene once in a blue moon, no touring (getting a diesel GQ for that)

[up2nogood]

Depends on the total range you want.

If you already have the LPG stuff and you're not going to be somewhere in this car where they don't sell LPG it would be a lot cheaper to play with LPG.

Just make sure you get the distributor advance altered to suit gas and the performance and economy will only suffer a little.

[CRUSHU]

i may be biased, as you are looking at my stuff, but i ran a 400ci engine, with a single 425, and it was good. it cost me about $50 to fill my tank, around 180l. cheap cheap!!

[CRUSHU]

Depends on the total range you want.

If you already have the LPG stuff and you're not going to be somewhere in this car where they don't sell LPG it would be a lot cheaper to play with LPG.

Just make sure you get the distributor advance altered to suit gas and the performance and economy will only suffer a little.

i beg to differ, as you can expect higher performance from lpg than petrol.with a higher octane rating, you can run more advance, and if you get the choice, you can run more compression as well.
but the economy will suffer a bit, as there is less energy value per litre compared to petrol.

[fatassgq]

out of curiosity what sort of range in km would you expect from 180 of gas with ya v8?

[up2nogood]

You're right on the increased performance bit, but the heads would have to come off in order to increase compression.
I was talking more from the engine in there at the moments point of view.

[chimpboy]

Dual fuel would be cool, but you'd have to do much more driving than you've outlined to recover the cost... so I vote straight petrol.

[Wendle]

if it for a straight out play thing you would have to be insane not to take the straight gas option. especially with the range you are going to be able to carry. your car will run perfect on any angle - climbing vertical, descending vertical or sitting on its side makes no difference to the way it runs, there is nothing to spill if you lay it over too much, no tank to suck in water if you drown it. it'll start and idle perfect buried in snow or in 40 degree heat if tuned right. i have no thermostat at all in my buggy and it'll still start first kick in the snow every time. i have barrell rolled it hard and it finished sitting on its side, still idling perfectly, waiting to be driven onto it's wheels again.
i think it is the ultimate fuel for something that is purely a play toy.
i have 72ltrs of usable fuel, and i get about 3.5 days of rock driving out of it, with the amount of fuel you are talking about carrying, you'll be laughing.

[V8Patrol]

It is not a daily driver and mainly used for day trips that are fairly local.

There's the answer right in front of you......... why would anyone want to pay for petrol when LPG is so much cheaper ????????
Seeing its driven locally then LPG refills arent a problem at all !, mine on the other hand HAS TO BE duel fuel because it gets into the out back where LPG isnt so availiable.

Go straight gas, possibly using the stuff CRUSHU has for sale, and pulling the petrol tank and fitting a gas tank in its place along with the existing tank inside. It would have approx 160-180 litres of usable gas.

Lets look at it this way .....
160 litres of LPG at 44 cents a litre =$70.40 a fill
asuming the longrange petrol tank holds the same and I'll cost it out at the current local price I'm paying ( as I did with the LPG price )
160 litres of petrol @ $1.07 a litre = $171.20 a fill

THATS A $100 BUCKS DIFFERANCE A FILL !!!!!!!!!

So I'll make this great offer to ya .......
I'll come and supply/fit all the LPG stuff for FREE if you send me $100 bucks every time you pull into a servo for fuel......

FIT DA LPG.....
its cheaper,
its enviromentally friendly compared to petrol,
it rarely jumps up 10 cents a litre !!!,
it isnt taxed like petrol and wont be untill 2009, (even then it will still be cheaper)
you'll get more power,
better ecconomy,
heaps better offroad,
and I'll get $100 a week for ever !

Kingy

[ludacris]

I would go the cheapest way to set up and run duel fule and get the motor tuned for gas.It will run ruff of petrol but it will get you out of trouble.

[80UTE]

Ive had V8 4B's for years on lpg and its my fuel of choice with my 80ute i had to engineer it on petrol so that all i set up with efi and all that crap. I had the idea that as i was only a play thing the fuel wouldn't matter but Ill go through $100-$150 in fuel per day so it makes it a an expensive day out just for fuel so now in going EFI and LPG with 90 ltr petrol and 300 ltr
lpg and it will run sweet that all the time and cheap wheelin to boot.

Wally

[Mudzuki]

Go gas, you won't regret it. Much kinder on the hip pocket.

[viperguy]

matey i have straight gas on my mav shorty.. with 2 tanks all up 180l of usable gas. this gives me a range of about 600ks, even more when touring. i have the original tb42 with a auto box running 33mtr's. i have no problems what so ever with my set up and would definately recommend a straight gas set up. if u use quality components and keep it in tune with a 4 gas anyliser and do the adjust the advance up a bit u will definately be satisfied with the power. cheap as chips to run and fill with my fill ups costing about 65 bucks. u will be more than happy with straight gas.

[MKPatrolGuy]

Thanks for all the encouraging replies guys. I have been swinging towards straight gas, but just needed to be convinced it was the right choice.

Looks like I'll be going straight gas after I get my Gearbox fixed.

[Cheezy4x4]

Go the BBQ gas. You can run cool angles ( Nose, tail, side and upsidedown) and you rig will think its still in the garage idleing away.

[Patroler]

out of curiosity what sort of range in km would you expect from 180 of gas with ya v8?

I get about 650-700ks for 180 litres in a 383 chev, twin gas researches, 35" bfg muds, general driving.

[GURU]

Dual all the way..
BUT run gas full time with motor tuned for gas so you get max performace and angle driving ability.

have petrol there as a pure backup when something may go wrong with the gas.

I do this in my RR, when i have to run petrol I have to retard the timing alittle due to the advance gas runs on, but I use petrol as a backup..always run gas due to better angle driving and it's my daily driver so its cheap.

[mauser7mm]

I don't know about you guys but I still reckon deisel the way to go even though it's the most expensive fuel of all, 180litres will get me 1500km on average that works out to $190 dollars at $1.06 cents a litre, even at $1.10 a litre it's $198 and off roading is where you really notice the economy difference.

[Beastmavster]

Sounds like dual fuel wont cost much to set up sicne it's all there already. Set up tune for straight gas and run premium (if available) or retard ignition if in the outback...

having both for extra range and options is good...

[MKPatrolGuy]

I don't know about you guys but I still reckon deisel the way to go even though it's the most expensive fuel of all, 180litres will get me 1500km on average that works out to $190 dollars at $1.06 cents a litre, even at $1.10 a litre it's $198 and off roading is where you really notice the economy difference.

This is my weekend play 4b and eventually comps. So like the grunt. I'm getting a GQ Diesel for touring for the exact reasons you said.

[MKPatrolGuy]

Sounds like dual fuel wont cost much to set up sicne it's all there already. Set up tune for straight gas and run premium (if available) or retard ignition if in the outback...

having both for extra range and options is good...

It is never going to see the outback, GQ will be for those trips.

[FEAROZA]

It is not a daily driver and mainly used for day trips that are fairly local.

There's the answer right in front of you......... why would anyone want to pay for petrol when LPG is so much cheaper ????????
Seeing its driven locally then LPG refills arent a problem at all !, mine on the other hand HAS TO BE duel fuel because it gets into the out back where LPG isnt so availiable.

Go straight gas, possibly using the stuff CRUSHU has for sale, and pulling the petrol tank and fitting a gas tank in its place along with the existing tank inside. It would have approx 160-180 litres of usable gas.

Lets look at it this way .....
160 litres of LPG at 44 cents a litre =$70.40 a fill
asuming the longrange petrol tank holds the same and I'll cost it out at the current local price I'm paying ( as I did with the LPG price )
160 litres of petrol @ $1.07 a litre = $171.20 a fill

THATS A $100 BUCKS DIFFERANCE A FILL !!!!!!!!!

So I'll make this great offer to ya .......
I'll come and supply/fit all the LPG stuff for FREE if you send me $100 bucks every time you pull into a servo for fuel......

FIT DA LPG.....
its cheaper,
its enviromentally friendly compared to petrol,
it rarely jumps up 10 cents a litre !!!,
it isnt taxed like petrol and wont be untill 2009, (even then it will still be cheaper)
you'll get more power,
better ecconomy,
heaps better offroad,
and I'll get $100 a week for ever !

Kingy

Dragged this up b/c Im looking into this stuff now. I was told gas is only 60% as efficient as petrol t/f use more lt/km than petrol. is this right?

[hottiemonster]

i am running straight gas at the moment, still have all the plumbing there for petrol but just no tank, keen to possibly set up another gas tank in the car for range as thats my disadvantage when it comes to comes such as nav runs and pajero challenge which i would love to do. anyone got any ideas of what is required for me to set up another tank in the car, i have a mate who has a spare 100 litre ? tank lying around at home.

also any other things i should do to the car becasue i am not running petrol anymore. i have punctured my petrol tank twice now as it sits low and gets smashed all the time, so its gone.

thanks

[AussieCJ7]

dual if you run out of gas or have a fault with the gas system while in the bush switch back to petrol easiy to fix gets you home you can run gas 99% of the time

[CRUSHU]

i am running straight gas at the moment, still have all the plumbing there for petrol but just no tank, keen to possibly set up another gas tank in the car for range as thats my disadvantage when it comes to comes such as nav runs and pajero challenge which i would love to do. anyone got any ideas of what is required for me to set up another tank in the car, i have a mate who has a spare 100 litre ? tank lying around at home.

also any other things i should do to the car becasue i am not running petrol anymore. i have punctured my petrol tank twice now as it sits low and gets smashed all the time, so its gone.

thanks

just hook the tanks in series, filler to the inlet of 1, out to the filler of 2, then to the convertor.



lpg is about 80% efficient, compared to petrol. supagas sell straight propane on the pump, about 5c dearer a litre, more effiecient, cleaner fuel, and higher octane, so can make more power with timing/compression. will work out about the same price, but will have to tune for it, then you will have problems running lpg. lpg is a mix of propane (good stuff) and butane (ciggie lighter gas, shitty, cheap filler).

[djr320kw]

Yep Straight LPG all the way for your setup it will serve you well. I get about 300 km out of about 80 litres of LPG in my 305 V8.

It is great to have and cheap. I will mention though LPG gas does run a bit hotter than petrol.

[Shorty40]

Straight gas. Dual fuel seems like such a compromise in tuning.

I was concerned about my GQ when I did the swap - but I love the straight gas now

As Wendle, cheezy and others have said, the offroad benefits of gas far outweigh and perceived negatives

Plus you can rig up a filler hose to run off a home gas bottle - booty fab jerry cans Although this is illegal and I never said that