80's and lpg

[tennismark]

any 80 owners who have pertol/lpg can help with advice. How good is the system? Savings? How often do you have to refuel? Thinking bout buying on 80 on gas and wondering what to expect.
Any advice, I'd appreciate it

[Emo]

I've just converted my 80 series to LPG. At the moment, the fuel economy is terrible but the bloke that fitted it said to wait until the 1500km reset of everything and then he'll tune it properly to run on gas. A bloke at work has a 100 series on LPG and he get almost 400km out of 80 litres. I run 33' BFG M/T's so I'm expecting to get high 20's litres per 100km so I expect to get around 350km's out of my 90 usable litres.
I've got an Impco system and there is a small loss of power but you don't notice it after a day or two.

It is certainly a pleasant experience filling up and getting change out of $50. Best thing I ever did.

[dgriffen]

I have just bought a 1997 auto 40th anniversary and as part of the deal, it came with a gas conversion. After three weeks of having it done, i am struggling to get 270km's out of a 90 litre tank, but then i really only do 250k's per week. It normally only costs about $30 to refill which is a hell of a lot better than the $50-60 i was spending on petrol, so yes, it is a great idea. The only thing i find dissapointing is that i would have thought i would get a lot closer to 400km per tank, but from what i have read on this, i t really depend on what tyres you are running. I haven't taken it bush yet, so it will be interesting to see what happens when i get off read. Me thinks it will be worse!!!

[dow50r]

Gas is labour intensive...the new injection systems are like efi...computer controlled, but the old systems are like the carbi on a datsun...change tune with the whether....you get different mixes of gas between two servos across the street from eachother, you must change air filters regularly, or they make the gas run rich, new plugs to hotter heat range, advance the timing to suit gas then petrol suffers....i couldnt bring myself to do the conversion. because of the problems people have with the systems....
BE CAREFUL....maintenance is a big expense if you dont do it yourself....
Andrew

[Suspension Stuff]

I had a 95 model 80 series last year with gas fitted by Toyota back in 1996. I am quite sure I was doing better then 350km per tank, but I was running stock tyres. I loved it but hmmm more to go wong with the head etc.

[dgriffen]

The odd thing with the gas conversion is that toyota themselves don't actually recommend you do it even though thousands have. According to the RAA, Toyota believe that burnt out valves are the issue as they were never designed to cope with anything other than what was recommended in the first place wether it be petrol or diesel. As long as your run it in accordance with the manufacturers specificcation, you shlound be fine. I run 6 out of seven on gas and the other on fuel to keep everything flowing properly. Even the gas mob that installed it said that you should always keep a minimum of a quarter of a tank of fuel because even though you are running the car on gas, there is still fuel running through the pipes and the fuel pump and if there is no fuel, the pump can melt so if you get the conversion, don't think that you can run the car just on gas.

[Suspension Stuff]

Toyota did replace the head when it went a year or 2 later and it only cost the previous owner $3,500
I am sure this work can be done a bit cheaper though.

[Ruffy]

An 80 on gas should have valve clearances checked every 20,000km. Not a cheap process in itself. If not they are prone to wearing seats causing tight clearances which reduces heat dissapation and results in burnt valves. $2500+.
Spark plugs require changing more often. Air filters require changing/servicing more often. Convertors and mixers require servicing and with LPG becoming more popular again it seems it's quality is degrading and causing more frequent convertor servicing aswell. Excluding the fitment cost, If you do 20,000km a year i would bank on you're servicing costs increasing by 500-1000 bucks a year if your paying someone to do the work.
On the other foot if you invest the 3 grand or so it's gunna cost you to fit gas then the divends from shares might be a couple of hundred bucks a year that you could put towards your fuel bill plus the value of the shares increasing!

[Emo]

Or the value of shares could drop as they have recently so the $3000 worth you bought, might now only be worth $2500.

I got my high LPG usage issue sorted out. I needed to get a balance line fitted. Although I haven't used a full tank of LPG since I got the balance line done, it's looking like I'm going to get around 28l / 100km on LPG compared with 22l / 100km on petrol

If I did 20,000km a year then LPG would cost me $2800. Petrol would cost me $6160 which is a saving of $3360 per year. In the first year I more than pay for my conversion. In the second year, I pay for the added maintenance of year one and year two and still pocket close to a couple of thousand dollars. Every year after that I'm saving around $2500 even taking into account your increase maintenance costs. Seems like a no brainer to me. Also the cost of petrol is going to continue to rise faster than the price of LPG so it's probably just going to get better and better.

[Emo]

I have just bought a 1997 auto 40th anniversary and as part of the deal, it came with a gas conversion. After three weeks of having it done, i am struggling to get 270km's out of a 90 litre tank

That sounds a fraction high. That's a bit over 33l / 100km. What tyres are you running? It's still alot cheaper than running on petrol though.

[Loanrangie]

With efi cars, you need to have fuel in the tank as they start on petrol then switch to lpg after 5 secs i believe.

[dinos4x4]

My 100series is on gas (OMVL) i get about 350ks on LPG
, mine is also a auto which makes a big differance.
I am also running a snorkel

the manuels get better fuel economy.

The best economy i got on LPG was 22lt/100k on a country run