Town gas cng ?

[grumpydad]

Town gas cng ?

Hi every one
Advice before I go any further
I need to run a generator it will use a petrol engine
About 100 horse power was going to us one with a carb
So that I could use a open loop system
The question is it all the same front end if I use cng
And can I run it strait of the gas main ?
As I have a gas supply near buy

Thanks

[rossko]

Don't think anyone has made Town Gas for decades.

The question is it all the same front end if I use cng

Same mixer, very different regulator for CNG.

And can I run it strait of the gas main ?

That's not CNG and you should not confuse the terms.
I guess in theory you could use an ordinary autogas regulator for that, not sure, but power output would be limited by the size of the inlet.
I doubt you could get 100bhp out of an ordinary domestic gas pipe, if that's what you mean by 'gas main'.

There's probably regulations about how to go about it.

[markocosic]

Pressure is low - nominally 21 mbar (0.021 bar) - and the capacity depends on the meter installed.

A "typical" meter fed from a "typical" low pressure supply is limited to ~64 kW. That's heat output, not engine output. Assume 20-25% efficiency for your generator so that supply might run a 12-15 kW generator.

Some properties are fed by a "medium pressure" supply to the meter. This is about 2 bar and you can nail a jock-off great big regulator onto this supply if you want to. When you get the quote for fitting one from National Grid - and the regulations with teeth for appliances connected directly to mains gas - I suspect that a bulk LPG tank or running a mains electrical supply will look far more attractive.

Not that I've ever sat down and looked into how long it'd take to fill a CNG car from the grid you...