Why Did Lpg Never Catch On?

Parthiban · July 23, 2008

I was driving around this afternoon, and was really surprised by the number of LPG cars and vans I saw around. This got me thinking, as a lot of people have clearly taken it on off their own backs so why haven't manufacturers made more of an effort?

At least in London, the infrastructure is pretty good, I can think of at least 3 stations that are within 10 mins of our house that have LPG and it's not that hard to find.

I can't help thinking that hybrid cars that ran on LPG instead of petrol would be complete no brainers when compared to diesels - an LPG prius would be ridiculously cheap to run :)

So does anyone know why manufacturers (except Vauxhall, Ford and Volvo I think) haven't produced LPG cars? From the normal conversions, it clearly doesn't take much to make a petrol engine run on LPG.............

dave1 · July 23, 2008

I've never worked it out either! I had a '72 Jag that ran on LPG/petrol back in late '70s and "Empire Stores" at that time were getting Transit vans for their delivery fleet that ran on LPG/petrol. At that time running on LPG gave a top end loss of around 10% and slower acceleration and the engines had to be run on petrol for around 1/4 of the time because of lubrication problems.

After all this time and the advances in LPG technology it is surprising.

What is also surprising is that the Government have withdrawn grants that were available to convert cars up to 5 years old and also the incentives for manufacturers that were available on new cars.

PCIronmike · July 24, 2008

I used to do a lot of work on LPG cars and many of the complaints were of backfiring as the fuel levels went down this was caused because as tank contents reduce the tank pressure reduced as well . That meant less fuel got to the vapouriser and ultimately to the engine. If the fuel in the car got to a very low level, the fuel/ air mixture could be so 'weak' (not enough fuel mixed in the air inducted) that the engine used to 'backfire' through the induction system, especially when the throttle was opened wide from a low setting. This used to cause problems ranging from a simple 'popping' sound right through to a large bang which would cause damage to air filter boxes, airflow meters and anything else in the induction system. Most LPG conversion fitters should of fitted an anti - blowback damage protector in the form of a one-way valve to cover this but it only protected your system from minor backfires . the big ones would almost always do damage . When these cars LPG tank run right down to empty the chances of this happening increased a hundredfold and it wasn't the fault of the installer or the equipment that was fitted . There was normally fair warning of low LPG tank contents from the vehicles as the engines used to become 'sluggish', especially during acceleration (much the same as running out of Petrol) but peolple would think its the conversion to the LPG for these sounds and carried on driving on the LPG because they were too tight to switch back to petrol and end up with a huge bill . I for one never liked LPG , it seemed to me that performance wise it was a lot short of petrol . Oh and the exhaust smelt like a calor gas fire !!! LOL

Regards

Paul. B)

Boxbrownie · July 24, 2008

Technology has moved on in leaps and bounds since those days! No problems now running your LPG tank dry.....but then you might have to as there are only around 1300 filling stations as compared to almost 10,000 conventional fuel stations in the UK....that is the biggest problem with LPG (and the cost of installation).

I considered LPG on my RX very seriously, but the nearest station to me (Essex) is an 8 mile trip out of my way, and as I would only be getting approx 200 miles per LPG tankful I would be searching too often for a station.....it is a good alternative, but it needs to be "refined" further in supply chain and fitment as a fuel source for it to catch on in the mainstream.

Best regards David

GlynnB · July 24, 2008

I think the reason is that the major advantage is the tax concession the government allows. However as soon as the numbers become significant then the tax concession will disappear. Certainly the guarantee of the concession has already gone. I converted my Range Rover and was very pleased with it but I cannot justify the cost of converting the RX due to low milage and long term uncertainty.

Parthiban · July 24, 2008

I think the reason is that the major advantage is the tax concession the government allows. However as soon as the numbers become significant then the tax concession will disappear. Certainly the guarantee of the concession has already gone. I converted my Range Rover and was very pleased with it but I cannot justify the cost of converting the RX due to low milage and long term uncertainty.

That is a fair point, but that's the same thing that happened with diesel but that really took off and is now so much more expensive than petrol.........

Same deal with filling stations, the popular it becomes, the more stations there will be..........also as far as I know the manufacturer produced cars (e.g. Volvo) were much more reliable than a privately converted car so all the problems mentioned above could have been ironed out.

As there are so many hybrids around London where LPG is quite easily attainable, I can't help but think they've all missed a trick by not also producing LPG versions that could have taken them soaring past diesels in terms of financial common sense.

shake · July 24, 2008

Same deal with filling stations, the popular it becomes, the more stations there will be..........

way i see it, the more popular it becomes the more tax they'll add on. diesel use to be cheaper than petrol but "they" realised diesel gets more miles in = less trips to the tax shop!

Parthiban · July 24, 2008

way i see it, the more popular it becomes the more tax they'll add on. diesel use to be cheaper than petrol but "they" realised diesel gets more miles in = less trips to the tax shop!

Oh yeah, that's dead right, if it had caught on then I'm sure the prices would be pretty close now. However, it didn't stop manufacturers making diesels, so what was wrong with LPG? Diesels used to be horribly slow, noisy and just all round rubbish so why did they jump on the diesel bandwagon but not on the LPG one?

shake · July 24, 2008

taking a wild guess, was diesel not widely available before LPG was being used at all? wouldnt make sense for a car maker to spend money trying to sell a product (LPG car) when diesel was already at every pump...

another take on it

is diesel cheaper to make? less time consuming?

who knows, were at the bottom of the food chain anyway

Mike_B · July 26, 2008

Diesel has an inherent advantage over petrol, which is that you need less of it to make the car go the same distance at roughly the same speeds. LPG has no such advantage, indeed you need more of it in absolute terms even than petrol. It's only cheaper to run cars on it because of the tax difference. When that goes, the cost of conversion and maintenance will just be a liability.

Mark W · July 26, 2008

surely the government would not raise tax on LPG if it caught on??? Afterall the only reason they tax us so heavily on petrol and diesel is because they care for the environment so much..... ;-)

Parthiban · July 26, 2008

surely the government would not raise tax on LPG if it caught on??? Afterall the only reason they tax us so heavily on petrol and diesel is because they care for the environment so much..... ;-)

Hahahahaha