Subaru Outback 2005 Conversion

[Hloni]

It's been a long exile as my password wasn't working...now we are back, and can update on some of the developments over the past few months

This past weekend I changed my x2 filters which I've been meaning to change. The odometer has clicked 30k km since the conversion, and ±70% of the distance was done on autogas. 90% of the refillings were done at an autogas station of sorts, and the remaining 10% self-refilling using the standard LPG bottle. I was shocked by what I saw when I removed the filter from the reducer, however I must be honest, I was glad I did the service as I'm uncertain I would have believed the pics were they sent by someone else. I also had a vacuum cleaner handy to extract as much of the dust as possible.

Any idea what the dust particles be from, or is that expected residue of sorts?

[Gilbertd]

Good job you've got filters, that wouldn't have done your injectors a lot of good. It looks like the fill from a bottle was from a particularly old and rusty bottle.....

[Hloni]

A question which was posed a few posts ago which I could never fully answer became apparent a few weeks ago when my "onboard" pump packed up, and I couldn't get hold of the installer to get a replacement under warranty. I removed the pump, and a quick online search revealed it to be a standard 6 bar fuel pump, Bosch 044 style! I must be honest, I was very disappointed especially considering how much I was charged for a run of the mill pump which I was told was an LPG pump!!

I think I have no option but to replace with the same, and continue to replace with them until I can source a proper 12v LPG pump.

[Hloni]

I took the plunge and got my Lexus 1UZ-FE converted to LPG. I've done about 200km, and so far I am very happy with the conversion and the performance.

Fuel economy on a test run wasn't far off running on petrol.

[Hloni]

I hadn't done any out of town trips which required self refueling for a while, so on my latest 1200km trip, I had to self refuel.

We last established that I'm running a standard "Bosch 044" pump, which we know is a petrol pump which might be hazardous...but hey, what's a bloke who doesn't live on the edge

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One of the challenges with the setup has been consistency in transfering from an LPG bottle into the autogas tank in the car. Always a hit and miss. Some occasions I'd get perfect transfer, other occasions not. I eventually was able track down a clear pipe which has allowed me quick visibility of the LPG being transferred. This also I must add creates heart palpitations as one sees the dirt coming out of the 9kg LPG tank

Clear "fuel/chemical" inlet pipe for better visibility of transferring taking place.

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Why the hit and miss?
I think this purely had to do with the clamps and how well the system was sealed. I replaced the clamps with nice worm gear clamps, which seal much better and don't seem to have a tendency to want to fail.

Selection of clamps purchased. Worm worked best.

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I have a few trips planned over the Christmas holiday season, will make minor tweaks to the system, but hope the pump holds. I need to most likely fit a 2nd shut off valve so I keep the system under pressure if transferring multiple bottles because when one removes the hose, the backfeed/backpressure i.e. small LPG left in the pump freezes the pump, and so one has to wait for it to defrost so it may function again. I already have a valve between the outlet of the pump and the autogas tank.

[LPGC]

I'm still interested in filling from bottles, thanks for the pics and info mentioning the Bosch 044 pump.

Is it propane or butane you fill the car tank with from bottles?

[Hloni]

Is it propane or butane you fill the car tank with from bottles?

It unfortunately is difficult to answer this confidently as references of the LPG suppliers note that "...LPG is a mixture of propane and butane...". Not sure if this is specific to South Africa or whether other countries also would use a combination depending on what's available at the time?

[LPGC]

A lot of European countries use the term LPG (or GPL etc) for gas sold at forecourts to be used as road fuel. The road fuel can be any mix of butane/propane (usually the colder the weather the higher percentage of propane in the mix, though in the UK it's 100% propane all year).

In the same countries bottled gas is usually butane (blue bottles), propane (red bottles), a mixture of propane and butane might be called something like patio gas and sold in green bottles... So we can tell which gas we're buying just by the colour of the bottle. The different colour bottles also use different regulator fittings which ensures people don't use a regulator designed for propane with butane or vice/versa, this is because butane and propane need a slightly different fuel/air mixture and the difference in pressure output of propane/butane regulators compensates for the different fuel/air mixtures... We can run any appliance (cooker etc) on butane or propane because the slightly different pressure outputs of propane/butane regulators compensates for the slightly different mixtures that propane/butane need. They're all LPG but we know which (butane, propane, or a mix) we're buying if we buy in bottles. The mixture won't matter so much for patio heaters because they're always used outdoors where-as a cooker, heater, etc, might be used indoors where it would be more important to avoid a too rich fuel/air mixture because it would produce more carbon monoxide than correct mixture.

I assumed you were buying gas in bottles (and not filling the bottles from a forecourt pump but buying in bottles filled by a bottled gas supplier) and assumed you'd know from the type/colour of bottle if you were using butane, propane or a mixture but I don't know if that's the case in South Africa.

[hitman2]

I'm in Portugal, propane comes in all colours of cylinders depending on the company which is selling it, butane seems to be in orange cylinders though whoever is selling it, BUT they do some funny things out here, and if you question it the answer is "its always been like that"

[LPGC]

Yeah I was wrong about the different colours for butane/propane, they do in the UK but apparently not in most of Europe. Still I think they butane/propane bottles have different fittings in Europe and will be marked butane/propane. Don't know about South Africa.

[hitman2]

Simon, they protect their own interest over here, each supplier of bottled gas has a different fitting and colour of cylinders, just to make it more difficult to change suppliers, I use propane for hot water and central heating (doesn't get used for that but its there if needed, use pellets tied into the same system, different boiler) anyway only one supplier will accept someone else's cylinders when empty and change fittings, and their marketing is to be the cheapest on the market, that's who w now use, but 45kg propane is now about 115e.....

[LPGC]

Simon, they protect their own interest over here, each supplier of bottled gas has a different fitting and colour of cylinders, just to make it more difficult to change suppliers, I use propane for hot water and central heating (doesn't get used for that but its there if needed, use pellets tied into the same system, different boiler) anyway only one supplier will accept someone else's cylinders when empty and change fittings, and their marketing is to be the cheapest on the market, that's who w now use, but 45kg propane is now about 115e.....

My last post wasn't in reply to your post mate, it was to Hloni and in acknowledgement of your post re the situation in Portugal.

If the bottled gas suppliers don't make their own brand regulators there must be some standardisation of fittings? Do you know if a tank contains butane/propane? A different regulator fitting for butane/propane?

[LPGC]

@Hloni, I have bought a Bosch 044 fuel pump (arrived), also bought an M18x1.5>M10 adapter (for the inlet) and an M12x1.5>M10 adapter (for the outlet) to facilitate connecting M10>8mm equivalent Faro connectors to... The adapters haven't arrived yet but when they do I will be able to test the 044 for pumping gas between bottles/tanks, as you do

I have no need to buy any bottled gas to try the pump out, I can just use an existing autogas tank I have here to try pumping gas from into my vehicle tank.

Thank you for the idea of using a Bosch 044 pump.

I wonder how the Bosch200 pump (the new replacement standard pump for the 044) would compare to the 044 for pumping LPG...?

[Hloni]

@Hloni, I have bought a Bosch 044 fuel pump (arrived), also bought an M18x1.5>M10 adapter (for the inlet) and an M12x1.5>M10 adapter (for the outlet) to facilitate connecting M10>8mm equivalent Faro connectors to... The adapters haven't arrived yet but when they do I will be able to test the 044 for pumping gas between bottles/tanks, as you do

I have no need to buy any bottled gas to try the pump out, I can just use an existing autogas tank I have here to try pumping gas from into my vehicle tank.

Thank you for the idea of using a Bosch 044 pump.

I wonder how the Bosch200 pump (the new replacement standard pump for the 044) would compare to the 044 for pumping LPG...?

I'm curious to see how it works for you and your thoughts. I did drill out the hole on the outlet a bit more, I think I used a 4mm drill bit, but I cannot recall. The 044 pump from factory seems to have a 1 way design, and at the time I was battling with consistent transferring. In hindsight, I think my challenge was purely because of minimal air escaping in the system which was rectified by using the worm gears clamps.

RE: BUTANE OR PROPANE BASED ON BOTTLE COLOURS
The bottle colours means nothing in South Africa as one cam go to any gas refiller and get their existing bottle refilled or exchanged. In many fuel station forecourts, there is a cage with 9, 14, & 19kg bottles that are pre-filled and one simply exchanges their empty one with a full one. BP = Green, Total = Orange, Cadac = Blue, etc... and if one orders gas from a local reseller, one simply exchanges the same weight bottle. Negotiating might come in the 14 & 19kg space where one wants a short vs a tall one depending on their application i.e. where it'll be stored.

[Hloni]

This past weekend I did a 1100km round trip. This calls for self-refueling if I want to maximise my LPG system. I fill the car and mobile cylinder at the local supplier, then buy 9kg bottled gas locally wherever I'm goin.
Flip...since installing the clear pipe, I get heart palpitations as I actually see how much dirt there is in the exchange bottles. I somehow think I actually need to open my toroidal tank and clean vacuum it inside as I suspect I have more debris than the magnet can hold. I am therefore planing on installing an inline filter pre-pump (pump has a sive inside, but I think it's meant to trap bigger particles than we find in the LPG) so I at least catch a bit of dirt before it enters the tank.
Where can I get the torque specs of the bolts securing the valve system?

I last changed the filter in September, literally 10k km ago. I think this is an indication that my tank might have collected more dirt than I'd initially believed. The gap though between the filter change was 20k km, so maybe I'm catching it a little early.

[Hloni]

This is what the filter looked like today, 10 000km since last changed. That's 3 month.

[LPGC]

I'm curious to see how it works for you and your thoughts. I did drill out the hole on the outlet a bit more, I think I used a 4mm drill bit, but I cannot recall. The 044 pump from factory seems to have a 1 way design, and at the time I was battling with consistent transferring. In hindsight, I think my challenge was purely because of minimal air escaping in the system which was rectified by using the worm gears clamps.

I now have the 044 pump assembled with the M18x1.5>M10 adapter > M10>Faro adapter on the inlet, and M12x1.5>M10 adapter > M10>Faro adapter on the outlet, but I have yet to put it to the test! Will report when I've tested it. I'll start with a leak test... I used gas thread paste on the threads but it remains to be seen whether or not that will seal it. If it is gas tight I won't need to worry about rubber hoses or clips that secure hoses failing because Faro / Polypipe connections will easily handle the pressures.

Also wondering if it would have been a better idea to use wider diameter 12mm polypipe on the inlet instead of the Faro pipe which is 8mm copper equivalent (outside diameter 8mm copper pipe equivalent, 6mm internal diameter)...

Have you ever had your pump cavitating due to lack of flow from the inlet?

[LPGC]

I've now tested the pump and it worked well!

I had a 100 litre (80 litre net) capacity autogas cylinder tank in the yard around half full with LPG, so containing around 40 litres. I ran one of my vehicles LPG tanks to completely empty then connected the pump setup between the cylinder tank and my vehicle's fill port. I opened the outlet valve on the cylinder tank (just a standard Tomasetto single hole cylinder valve which I'd disabled the elctro-valve on, so I just had to open the thumbscrew valve to open the outlet valve) and waited until I could hear the hissing and flow of gas sounds due to gas flowing from the higher pressure cylinder into the completely empty lower pressure tank on my vehicle had stopped. At that point I reckon only around 5 itres had flowed from the cylinder into my vehicle tank. I then connected the pump to a car battery and in less than 10 minutes it transfered the entire contents of the cylinder into my vehicle tank

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[LPGC]

I have since improved the setup by fitting a quick fit / swivel connector on the outlet (that connects to the vehicle fill port). The problems without the quick fit / swivel connector are that (a) when screwing the adapter into the UK bayonet type filler, the whole line / pump would need to twist to avoid twisting/kinking the piping. With the quick fit / swivel connector the line can be completely disconnected during screwing the filling adpater to the UK filling port, but even if it isn't disconnected the quick fit adapter doubles as a swivel connector so the adpater can be screwed to the vehicle filling port without twisting the pipe anyway. (b). The quick fit connector seals both halves of the connection when it is disconnected, like an air-line fitting. This prevents gas escaping from the pump and lines when the line is disconnected from the vehicle fill port. This further prevents 'loss of prime' of the pump and prevents pumping compressed air into the vehicle's LPG tank. Pumping air into a vehicle LPG tank can lead to loss of capacity in some situations e.g. forecourt pumps adjust pressure according to temperature (weather) conditions in attempt to keep pump pressure constant above tank pressure in any temperature / weather conditions to try to keep consistent fill speeds. In cold weather tank pressure may only be 3 bar, pump pressure may then be 7 bar (4 bar above expected tank pressure)... If we have a tank full of air at atmospheric presure and we pump liquid into the tank (like liquid LPG) the air in the tank is compressed above the rising level of liquid and just the air would reach 7 bar when the tank was filled to 80% of full. If tank pressure reaches pump pressure the pump will no longer pump any gas into the tank (pump pressure needs to be higher than tank pressure to be able to pump anything into the tank).. but even before the pressures are equal any higher pressure in the tank due to compressed air will slow the filling speed from the pump. This is why I purge tanks of air before I fit them.

Another pic showing the setup laid out on the floor not connoected to anything. The input line to the pump doesn't have a fitting attached because I have just disconnected it from the cylinder tank (just a normal Faro type fitting so the black pipe attached directly to that fitting). I will be fitting another quick fit / swivel connector to the inlet line (and obvously connecting a fitting to that quick fit / swivel connector to allow conecting to a bottle).

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[LPGC]

This worked perfectly to top up from a red Calor bottle today....

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