500+ bhp v8 AMG - finally started it!

[piffle]

Good morning,

I have been a very silly boy this weekend and gone and bought a 2007 e63 AMG estate. (pics here if you are interested - http://www.utterpiffle.com/Cars/Benz/E63/).

Need some advice please

It looks like several people in Germany have LPG'd this fantastic engine and I'd like to do the same. I don't claim to be an expert, but have successfully converted about 10 cars over the years, including my outgoing 1999 e55 AMG, so I have a basic understanding - at least of the concepts.

I have two things rattling around my mind - firstly, what kit should I buy and secondly, where the bloody hell will it go! That engine bay is stuffed...

I do a 1000 mile round trip to Germany every three weeks, so I should probably get the spanners out fairly quickly!

The e55 will be broken for parts, so if I could use some of my existing kit, that would be great, but not sure if this will be possible. The new car is about 64hp per cylinder on full throttle.

- 2x magic III 250/350 hp reducers - these worked brilliantly in my e55, but that was 'only' 354hp. 8mm pipe front to back, then split into two sixes after the solenoid into the reducers. They were set to 1.2 bar, but think they go up quite a bit more. I do like the compactness of the Magic units though - I see they sell higher capacity ones as well (350/450hp), so maybe two of these be suitable? - there really is no space under that bonnet though!

- Magic injectors - nozzles drilled to 2.5mm - again, they've been brilliant for 35k miles. Can I use these if I just drill out the nozzles further, or even remove the nozzles completely? Will it idle if I do this? Documentation on these is sketchy at best, but seems to suggest they will run up to 60bhp per cylinder.

- Romano RISN ECU - this I want to replace this anyway as I've used it on 4 different cars since 2008 and it is probably very out of date - although I did update the firmware 2 years ago. Options other than Prins? Is the stag 300 system any good? It advertises itself as self mapping, which I like the sound of.

- Bosch stand-off adaptor thingies. Not sure of the name, but they raise the injector rail 10mm and give lpg inputs. I want to use these again as would prefer not to drill the inlet manifold. Anyone see any problem with this, other than not being being able to fit the engine cover / air filters back on easily?

I guess I have a budget of around a grand for parts.

Anything else I need to consider for converting this car. Has anyone ever done one? Where the hell do I locate the reducers/filters! Did I say there is no room in there?!

Excuse the long winded message, but any advise would be very much appreciated.

Oh yeah, look how little space there is in there!

[LPGC]

Just bought this new laptop, most of my records/pics reside on the hard drive in the broken old one (have backups but a hard drive caddy is easiest method to retrieve).. Not sure if I've converted this exact model but have converted most AMG models, normally aspirated and supercharged, E class and other models. May have some pics on old hard drive or photobucket... Haven't looked yet but it's just occurred to me I may have posted pics on this forum.

As you say the biggest obstacle to conversion is tight space - not much space in the engine bay for reducer(s), ECU etc / the inlet air ducting, air filters and plastic loom carriers can make finding space for injectors and associated piping difficult.

Have never used injector risers on these models.. On the plus side, they might space the plastic loom carriers away from the manifold, allowing rails to sit atop the manifold with piping running through the gap / singular injectors to attach onto risers with piping to gas manifolds through the gap. On the downside, this would mean the carriers would be in the way of the trim/filters... maybe make some adjustments to trim/filter brackets if you take this route.

On some models there is space between the rad and engine to fit MJ reducer(s), or in the void above undertray trim forward of front wheel arch(s). ECU may fit in Ebox, or under plastic trim over strut tops, or between wiper assembly and removable firewall... Bare in mind crash area voids...

Engine probably has heater water shut off solenoid at the rear, if so this needs disabling to allow water to flow through the reducer (and matrix) constantly - achieved simply disconnecting it's connector, but then must connect a dummy load (LPG solenoid coil) or climate control detects a faulty water solenoid.

Since you are scrapping your E55 and will have all the bits you mentioned from that, I would use those bits... The injectors and reducers are very small physically, that's a plus on this motor. MJ injectors are very linear and excellent flowers, the 60bhp rating is at 1bar, you can crank pressure up to around 1.5 bar with your reducers if need be and they will flow a lot more than 60bhp per cylinder.

Maybe leave nozzle size on the MJ injectors at 2.5 for initial setup and see how that works out, can always crank the pressure to 1.5. You may find an increase in nozzle size is necessary... There is a big jump in flow from 2.5 nozzles to open (no) nozzles with MJ injectors and it can be difficult to drill MJ nozzles to 3mm.. If it works out that open nozzles are too large at 1 bar, and 2.5 nozzles only a bit small at 1.5bar, would be worth buying some 2.7 or similar (7/64") drills. Seems 2.7/2.8 is a handy nozzle size for MJs on big power stuff!

You could fit a different make ECU from the outset but since you have the Romano ECU you might as well try it, not a big deal doing wiring (in case you decide to change it for another make ECU later) compared to fitting other LPG components and the petrol addition facility in your Romano (AEB) ECU (if available with your ECU - I noted you only updated firmware to closest to 2008 spec) can help identify/sort ignition and lack of LPG flow related problems (not that you'd want to have final setup involve petrol addition but another tool in the diagnostic box). Your Romano ECU may not have injector settings that are a great match for the MJ injectors (most Romano ECUs only have Romano injectors listed and most of those are not the most linear injectors) and being a 2008 spec may only read injector pulses from the first cylinder (blue wires) on each bank (then every LPG injector on that bank gets same duration pulse) , but might as well fit it at first and see if you can get good results with it, if not then a more recent AEB ECU such as a recent King will simply plug into your loom in it's place, have better suited injector drivers (select Matrix) and will read petrol injector pulses for every cylinder. Having said that, have noted some curious rpm readings with more recent AEB ECUs on this type of Merc (with and without rpm wire connected) so the old Romano may have a plus point there (never a problem with older AEB ECUs).

Don't believe hype about self mapping systems.

Simon

[piffle]

Hi Simon,

Wow! Thank you so much for such a full and thoughtful reply!

Any photos of where you managed to mount stuff in that (or similar) engine bay would be most appreciated...

I'm still not sure whether the injector risers will work in that tight space, but I'll have a play and let you know - I guess in any case, I will probably have to modify the air filter housings. What's the longest pipe I can put between the injectors and inlet? Presumably the answer to that is 'as short as possible'.

Thank you for the advice on the heater shut off valve and dummy load - noted. I also heed you simple advice about the self mapping ECU's not being all that.

Nice to know that the existing ECU will probably be sufficient - at least for now. I'm not sure of the firmware version off the top of my head - and my mate has currently borrowed my diagnostic laptop, but I'll find out.. Yes, it only reads pulse from cyl 1 and you can (i have) configured it to squirt in a bit of petrol at higher rpm. One thing I never did connect on the other cars was into the lambda sensors. It seemed to run fine before - are the readings really needed?

It's going to be a bit of a dribs and drabs project due to work/family commitments, but I hope to make some good progress on it by Christmas.

Again, thank you for your advice - I'll update this as a sort of build thread and will almost certainly be back on here screaming for help again soon!

Chris.

[LPGC]

Chris,

You're welcome. I haven't got around to looking for pics etc yet but you have the car there and can check mounting sites against the possibles I suggested

Always good to have pipe lengths between injectors and manifold nozzles short and this seems more critical on performance/modern Merc V8s than most engines (including earlier Merc V8's). You might even consider individual injectors; Even if you use your rails, would try to install manifold nozzles in a location that would allow singular injectors to fit in case you want to switch to that type later. Your rail mount MJs use the same physical injector as singular MJs except for the screw on gas inlet.

Since you're not starting this install right away you could obtain some singular MJ gas inlets (from HL Propan), remove your MJ injectors from rails (use blunt end of small drill to knock out the 2 securing spring clips from each injector), buy a couple of 12mm in 4x6mm out gas manifolds and you might be able to mount your injectors almost directly on the manifold, would help with smooth idle, accurate fueling during acceleration and (on an auto) prevent clunky gear changes.

Simon

[piffle]

Hi guys,
so a few months and 5000 miles later, I finally found some time to start the install - it's small progress, but still feels good to have actually started it.

Firstly, I just need to say that this car is bloody brilliant! It is far better than I'll ever be and certainly keeps me on my toes. A £90 fill up every 250 miles is rather damaging, but then it does spend a lot of time on the autobahn at well into three figures with a grinning loon behind the wheel, so not really unexpected. I really need to find the time to convert this!

So, I usually start with the reducers, then work out from there, but for some reason cracked on with the injectors first this time. Thanks to Simon's advice I bought a few bits... I got the individual screw on gas inlets for my MJ injectors, as well as some 2.8mm nozzles (mostly because they were about 45p each ). As discussed earlier, I've gone for the riser approach, rather than drilling the inlet manifold, and it all fits rather well with some minor adjustments to some of the plastics. The best bit is that I got all 8 injectors to fit under the injector rail, which means the injector nozzles are no more than about 5mm from the inlet to the risers. They are placed so that they are in sort of four X-patterns, if that makes sense. I tried spacing them out first, but it all seemed to fit better that way. Current state of play is 8 hoses poking out the back of the engine, so I need to fit a couple of manifolds, then run two 12mm hoses down to the reducers.

Simon was correct in saying that there is a void in front of one the wheels, so I plan to put the reducers in there. I always wanted a completely stealth install, so that fits in with that rather well. Hope to get a few days between Christmas and new year, so maybe an update then.

Oh, one quick question, the petrol injectors on this car have really small connectors, not the usual ones with the metal clip. Can I buy male and females ones of those anywhere, or do I just need to cut into the loom? Although this is the 4th car this kit has been installed to, I have no intention of removing it from this one, so I suppose I could just hard-wire it all in, although that wouldn't help if need to do any fault finding...


Anyway, a couple of photos:

Injectors are all fitted here, and the right hand airbox modified and re-fitted. As you can see, nothing is visible, and it all fits well. Just a small mod to the airbox where the injector rail is a bit higher. Also, a small tweak on the front clip of one of the AMG airbox covers where the injector rail sensor sits, as this is now 10mm higher (bottom right of pic)


And a close up of the x-pattern I used for the injectors. It all fits snugly without actually being tight. I presume I don't need to actually secure them to anything with them like this? They sit very sucure against the risers due to the short pipe between. They are not going anywhere!


Any feedback/criticism always welcome!

[Gilbertd]

Just one thought, the injectors would be less bulky and less prone to leaking, if you'd used crimp or spring clips rather than Jubilee clips.

[LPGC]

With such short pipes between injector outlets and manifold fittings / risers, I too consider injectors to be secure without need of extra brackets etc to hold them in place - The stiffness and strength of injector hosing and risers they're attached to related to weight of singular injectors would compare favourably to mounting a heavy rail of 4 injectors on separate bracket on 2 rubber bushes in usual fashion.

Off to a good start, though you may want to protect injector wires at injector end from damage from rubbing/scraping against anything, injectors may also be loud if touching metal components.

Simon

[piffle]

Just one thought, the injectors would be less bulky and less prone to leaking, if you'd used crimp or spring clips rather than Jubilee clips.

Yes, I thought that as I was struggling to get the screwdriver in to tighten them up! Definitely a thought for the future. Thank you.

With such short pipes between injector outlets and manifold fittings / risers, I too consider injectors to be secure without need of extra brackets etc to hold them in place - The stiffness and strength of injector hosing and risers they're attached to related to weight of singular injectors would compare favourably to mounting a heavy rail of 4 injectors on separate bracket on 2 rubber bushes in usual fashion.

Off to a good start, though you may want to protect injector wires at injector end from damage from rubbing/scraping against anything, injectors may also be loud if touching metal components.

Simon

Hadn't considered the noise they'd make... Good point! Although on the e55, they were far quieter than the petrol injectors... At the risk of being a bit 'bodgey', I may just wrap some electrical tape around where there is metal on metal.
I will also take the wire comment into consideration when I wire the electrics.

Thanks both for the feedback so far...

[zenman63]

Sounds good, keep me posted as I have an ML 63 AMG same engine.

[LPGC]

Sounds good, keep me posted as I have an ML 63 AMG same engine.

I've converted quite a few, all run very well.

Simon

[zenman63]

Pictures of the ML would be good, any more progress on this, the stand off's are a great idea.

[piffle]

Ahh, finally found some time to continue with the install on my car. Still not finished it though, and after this, I know I won't have time again for a few weeks.

As above, any comments, criticisms or advice is always greatly appreciated!

So, tools out, nice day


I wasn't happy with the untidy install of the LPG injectors - they were too tightly crammed in, and the use of jubilee clips messy. I ripped it all out, and started again. Much neater this time and using spring clips, the pipework seemed to fall into place without a fight




I had mocked up where the reducers were going to sit before, and I have now completed this. Even with all the pipework and wires, it sits nicely in the front bumper and the wheel arch liner completely hides it.




Unfortunately, I couldn't squeeze the front solenoid in there, so that had to go behind the liner on the other side of the front wheel. I know it is supposed to be "close" to the reducers, but I guess it will be safe there.


The tank was easy to fit, although being only 200mm tall, it made connecting the pipework really difficult without kinking as there was no space under the gas input/output connectors. I finally worked it out, but not without much swearing and wasted (mostly kinked) pipe. My pipe bender is only 90 degrees, not 180 which didn't help.







Pipework under the car was relatively simple though. Ran it inside the side skirt, up and over the rear wheel arch (inside the liner), then around the back of the suspension to the rear well. Screw-clipped it to the body every 30cm or so. It passed fairly close the exhaust at the rear so I put heat shield over the pipe there, although it is a next to a plastic pipe that is stock, so it obviously doesn't get too hot anyway! The big plastic cover for the well fitted back over the pipework below, and this is now also hidden.



Oh, and I know these are not approved in the UK (although they are commonplace everywhere else in Europe), but I really like the stealth look of these filling adaptors. I refuse to drill a big hole in the body, although I could mount a regular filler underneath the bumper if it is considered that these really are a no no! Comments welcome on the use/legality of these!



So that's it for now. Other that the fuel gauge/switch, the physical install is complete. I am quite happy with the way it is all hidden away. I just have the wiring loom to do in the engine bay, then it's time to go fill up and start testing.

[Gilbertd]

Only two comments. The main problem with those 10mm fillers isn't the filler itself but the adapter you have to use with them. 10mm isn't that big and they are usually made of brass so the weight of the filler nozzle can snap the adapter off. You'll need to be careful when filling to make sure it isn't taking the full weight.

Like you, I'd prefer to see the pipework hidden away but if you intend getting the install certified, it's likely they will take exception to it as the CoP says:
4.4.4 Pipelines should not be installed where any part is permanently hidden from view and cannot be inspected regularly.

[LPGC]

Somebody phoned me the other day, they'd read this thread and were asking for further info on the heater water shut-off solenoid at the rear of the engine.. Can't imagine that was you, or if it was your written English is far better than your spoken English! But this brings me to ask - Did yours have a water shut off solenoid, if so did you disable it?

Without re-reading all the thread, did I or someone else suggest your choice of liquid filter solenoid? A good choice!

You ought to have fitted the tank with valve at the rear to prevent fuel slosh from leaving the pickup pipe dry on heavy acceleration with partly filled tank.

What size did you drill nozzles to and what pressure are reducers set at? Are they the (taller) 400bhp MJ reducers or shorter 350bhp MJ's? Besides the bit of difference in design and rating the taller ones have a different (higher up the scale) range of pressure adjust-ability.

Presumably there's some sort of balance pipe between reducer gas outlets somewhere in the system?

Simon

[piffle]

Two brilliant and very useful replies, thank you!

Only two comments. The main problem with those 10mm fillers isn't the filler itself but the adapter you have to use with them. 10mm isn't that big and they are usually made of brass so the weight of the filler nozzle can snap the adapter off. You'll need to be careful when filling to make sure it isn't taking the full weight.

Like you, I'd prefer to see the pipework hidden away but if you intend getting the install certified, it's likely they will take exception to it as the CoP says:
4.4.4 Pipelines should not be installed where any part is permanently hidden from view and cannot be inspected regularly.

Yeah, I'm aware that a lot of weight could easily be put on that adaptor, but I ran it on my e430 for several years without problem - good to be re-reminded of it's inherent weakness though..
As for the hidden pipe. Damn! I was really pleased with the way it sits. Surely these rules are a little out of date, as it would actually be quite silly to put the pipe completely on view due to all the plastic panels under the car? The entire floorpan of the w211 Mercedes is covered in plastic, and if I had to then remove those panels for regular maintenance, I'd first have to disturb the pipework. Interested to hear from other installers whether this would actually fail certification? - the wording of 4.4.4 says "should" not "must". Or am I just being defensive?

Somebody phoned me the other day, they'd read this thread and were asking for further info on the heater water shut-off solenoid at the rear of the engine.. Can't imagine that was you, or if it was your written English is far better than your spoken English! But this brings me to ask - Did yours have a water shut off solenoid, if so did you disable it?

Without re-reading all the thread, did I or someone else suggest your choice of liquid filter solenoid? A good choice!

You ought to have fitted the tank with valve at the rear to prevent fuel slosh from leaving the pickup pipe dry on heavy acceleration with partly filled tank.

What size did you drill nozzles to and what pressure are reducers set at? Are they the (taller) 400bhp MJ reducers or shorter 350bhp MJ's? Besides the bit of difference in design and rating the taller ones have a different (higher up the scale) range of pressure adjust-ability.

Presumably there's some sort of balance pipe between reducer gas outlets somewhere in the system?

Simon

I speak the Queens English Simon! Or something like that... No, it wasn't me that called you. However, the car does have the solenoid and I haven't done anything about it yet. As you said before though, it just needs a dummy load to stop the error - I am mindful of this and will use an old 6mm solenoid that I have kicking about. But I haven't started the wiring in the engine bay yet, so that's on the list there.

The 8mm solenoid.. I think you recommended it when I installed all this kit in the e55 a few years ago - it's just being recycled. I guess I should probably replace the filter though?

I assume the injectors are the shorter ones - I bought them originally for my e430 5 years ago (using 1.5mm nozzles), I then drilled them out to 2.5mm for the e55, and then replaced the nozzles for this. I actually bought nozzles from my German supplier (Hybrid Supply) as they stocked all sizes and were only 79 cents each. I bought 2.8mm, which should be about right. Do you think I might need the larger injectors then? The car is currently 514ps apparently, but will be upped to 562ps when I get the speed limiter removed next month - but hey, I work in Germany, this is an essential mod!

Edit: I just went and looked at the injectors on my suppliers site - there seems to be two types of magic injector - regular and FX. I have the regular, but I can't find reference to the tall and short ones. The FX ones appear to have a larger operating pressure and quicker opening/closing times. They are about 20% more expensive. I guess they all have a finite life - mine must have done 40k miles and were working perfectly when last removed.

And yes, there is a balancer pipe. I'm using two Magic 1 to 4 filters, and they have a fifth 5mm output. These are joined together and T'd off to the AEB025 map sensor.

Thank you for your comment about the tank being 180 degree out. I swore when I read that, but of course it makes perfect sense. It's a couple hours work I guess, but I will turn it around - probably with more swearing trying to get the pipes to fit again!

Hopefully another update in a few weeks. I don't intend to leave it so long this time, as I can see the end in sight - but then family plus working abroad plus being bugged to rebuild the kitchen etc - you know how it is...

Thank you, this forum really is a fantastic resource.

[LPGC]

Could maybe use the info you gave us on injectors and nozzles to give you further advice (coming to) but was actually asking about short/tall reducers! The points may be related because the shorter reducers rated at 350hp have pressure adjust-ability between around 0.9 to 1.4 bar while taller MJs are adjustable between around 1.2 to 1.8 bar. Didn't know whether to leave this bit in my post - on paper spec can be different to real world spec, some short MJ reducers can struggle to flow 270bhp worth of gas, while in general reducers are capable of flowing a bit more towards the higher end of pressure adjust-ability than towards the lower end of pressure adjust-ability. Hoping those you have and your overall tank valve / feed pipe / T pieces / solenoid arrangement will flow enough for the engine on full chat but you're definitely off on the right foot with what you've fitted etc. Tank valve 8mm outlet?

(Coming to...) I reckon you'd get good results with either type (and pressure range) of reducer with 2.8 nozzles, with 2.5 nozzles you might need more pressure than the shorter type could go up to. From this you could work out I'd first set pressure at around 1.3/1.4 bar and adjust from there. If you remove nozzles from MJ tall (old type) injectors they flow a load of gas like having bigger than 3.5 nozzles, so in that case would expect less pressure necessary. Without nozzles also highlights machining differences in injectors so it's then an even better idea than usual to compare flow rates of each individual injector to the others (usual way by switching cylinders back to petrol and noting how each affects fuelling/calibration).

Sorry to be the person bringing the bad news on tank orientation! Queen's English except when cursing? Better not mention I reckon a 5mm pipe connection between reducer outlets (if this is acting balance pipe and if this is 5mm) may not be sufficient to ensure equal pressure to both sides of the engine.. Also 5mm pipe will often leak on AEB025 pressure sensors unless done up rather tight with little jubilee clip rather than a spring clip, 4mm pipe best for the P sensor to ensure no leak there (in the old days buying complete OMVL kits, injectors used 5mm pipe and more than enough was supplied to leave a length that might have been used for P sensor, yet 4mm pipe was supplied for P sensor). Oops sorry!

FX injectors are shorter and on paper spec is better but I'm not sure on paper spec equates to real world spec, I think the original MJ's (that I was thinking you had when I first wrote this) will outperform FX in flow and opening speed (but FX can be even more handy for very tight installs). Talking a marginal difference, I wouldn't expect any difference in nozzles necessary using newer FX MJ injectors compared to older MJ injectors.

Hope you don't mind my comments, intended to be helpful, I think you've done great so far.

Simon

[Gilbertd]

As for the hidden pipe. Damn! I was really pleased with the way it sits. Surely these rules are a little out of date, as it would actually be quite silly to put the pipe completely on view due to all the plastic panels under the car? The entire floorpan of the w211 Mercedes is covered in plastic, and if I had to then remove those panels for regular maintenance, I'd first have to disturb the pipework. Interested to hear from other installers whether this would actually fail certification? - the wording of 4.4.4 says "should" not "must". Or am I just being defensive? :)

I suspect that is one of those things that would be open to interpretation but, most examiners would take the view that although it doesn't say must it does say should so if it is possible to have it visible it should be. However, that section is a little contradictory anyway. 4.4.4 says that it should be visible yet 4.4.1 says that it should follow the safest route and be protected from impact. Now I can't think of a single car where you could comply with both, you are always gong to have to run the pipe behind something so that it is protected from impact.

It's like the argument we get at work sometimes. Just because a document doesn't say you can't do something, doesn't mean you can. If it says you can, you can, if it says you can't you can't, then you get the grey bits...... In the same way as the CoP says: Vehicle filling connections that require the use of adaptors, for filling with "Bayonet" filling guns, should not be fitted., should not again and not must not.

Personally I'd argue it but I'm an argumentative bugger at the best of times......

[LPGC]

Agreed with you both Piffle / Gilbert.

As for the hidden pipe. Damn!

I suspect that is one of those things that would be open to interpretation but, most examiners would take the view that although it doesn't say must it does say should so if it is possible to have it visible it should be

I reckon most inspectors would pass the pipe routing, given that other possible routes may all have their own shortcomings (passing close to exhaust for example) which should be considered a much worse compromise than hidden pipe. But being a grey area there will always be inspectors that would fail the routing, and in some of those cases a contributing factor would be their hope of charging for a re-test or being tasked with remedial work, or from wanting to find fault because they're the sort (dark side of some human's nature) that though impressed with your work still feel the need to tell grasshopper that he hasn't become master just yet, there's points grasshopper hasn't addressed properly, master would have done it different and master has the power to fail grasshopper.. But that wouldn't be to say they wouldn't route the pipe the same way or in a worse compromised way if converting the same vehicle themselves.. We're all familiar with the sort!

There are a lot of vehicles where it would be impossible to route piping while not falling foul of some grey area in some inspectors eyes but the common sense view should be to much prefer hidden over heat, abrasion, vibration, risk of being trapped.

As you say Piffle, many modern vehicles have plastic undertrays, which in many cases cover all the other pipes (petrol, brakes, etc). It often makes most sense to route gas pipe along with those other pipes where it is neat and protected like all the other pipes there.. And on 'Hidden from view / inspected regularly' - More important to inspect brake pipes than gas pipes anyway?

You didn't make things easy for yourself using copper pipe though..

Fitting more pipe clips?

Most inspectors probably won't suffer from grasshopper/master syndrome, most probably won't be out to charge several times for repeat inspections or remedial work, most will probably take the view that pipe routing on this vehicle will be questionable in some grey area of the rules whichever way you routed it and that you chose one of the best compromises.. If all of those 3 probably's are 90% each that would make the odds of a pass from random inspector 73% - but I'm not sure I'd rate each probability as high as 90%. Pipe clips aside, and I haven't seen pics of routing under the car yet, your install is looking safe to me and I expect Gilbert will agree... You could probably increase your chances with random inspector by showing them this thread before inspection Or by having it inspected by someone who you already know seems impressed with your install, doesn't seem to suffer from master/grasshopper syndrome and generally seems to have a common sense view. I could arrange your inspection if you brought the vehicle to me.

Personally I'd argue it

You and me both mate. Can imagine blood boiling after being told I shouldn't have routed pipe where it can't be seen, should instead have routed it at the side of plastic tray where it's lower to the road and not protected or something...

I'm an argumentative bugger at the best of times

Aha you said it mate! Next time we have a tiff I'll remind you of that Nah, me too Gilbert!

On the should not / could not situation, how's this for a line of reasoning.. All the points in Cop are supposedly carefully considered, if not carefully considered then the Cop might as well not exist. Why then do the considerations not extend to being very specific in wording, i.e. why do points say 'should not' instead of 'must not'? I reckon it's because at the time of writing some degree of flexibility was intended to be left in the hands of the people who Cop would be intended to apply to - In the case of LPG installers this would (hopefully in the eyes of LPGA) be LPGA installer members - After all LPGA tried/try to push the message that customers should have their vehicle converted by one of their members. It would have been reasonable to expect that sometimes compromise/flexibility would be necessary or some vehicles would never be possible to convert to meet Cop, and also reasonable to expect that nevertheless such installs could be perfectly safe. But now we have a situation where UKLPG members are in the minority of installers, no law has come about to say vehicles must be converted or inspected by members... All those grey areas can still be interpreted by members as they like and this isn't always done from a common sense / neutral / take advantage of grey areas where necessary to get the job done but get it done safely point of view... while expecting their own work. Sometimes this is done from the opportunity to make a bit more cash by failing a vehicle in for testing that has been converted by someone else (not an LPGA/UKLPG member) point of view.

It's like the argument we get at work sometimes. Just because a document doesn't say you can't do something, doesn't mean you can. If it says you can, you can, if it says you can't you can't, then you get the grey bits......

Agreed with your point and this is not intended to bring about argument but I wonder if, in the same way as my point above, the people who wrote the rules in your scenario anticipated those rules would bring about discussion in the workplace between engineers who know their stuff.

Simon

[piffle]

Once again, thank you both for taking the time to reply in such detail...

@Simon
Any comments are welcome, positive or negative - it's all a learning curve. Even though I've converted about 10 cars in my time, this one is much more complicated (and tighter) than anything I've attempted before.

I'll see what I can squeeze out of this combination of reducers and injectors. If I need the larger (taller) reducers, then so be it. They are about €80 each. Of course with the Romano CPU, it does allow you to squirt a little petrol when over a certain rpm. It's cheating I know, but I think it will fill in if my system is not quite man enough. At the end of the day, my car is used primarily for the commute to Germany, so it's not being thrashed too often (ha!). I won't begrudge it using some petrol when in play mode. Looking at the stats from my fuel app on the e55, it needed a 65l tank of petrol every 4300 miles (averaged over 30k miles), and that was configured to use petrol above 4500 rpm. Not too bad...

The multivalve has 8mm inlet and outlets. It's 8mm pipe to the front, 8mm solenoid, then splits into two 6mm inputs to the reducers. If I remember correctly the larger Magic reducers have 8mm inlets.

I had a 5mm pipe on the AEB025 last time secured with a jubilee and it was fine - it was also balanced with same 5mm (off the back of the injector rails that time). But of course I take your advice. Should I just T off the two 12mm hoses then and put a 12mm pipe between? I'd probably do that behind the engine to keep it hidden.

There is an alternative to copper pipe?

Confession time: I've never had any of my installs certified before.. I'm not sure why I see it as more important this time - Is it because it's still quite a valuable car? Is it because I've since turned 40 and now sensible/law abiding? Not really good reasons, but there must be some man-logic in there somewhere...
There is a guy reasonably local to me that will inspect amateur installs, but I don't know anything about him. I may take you up on the offer to certify my car thank you, as you've obviously followed the story and already advised on the bits I need to fix. I think it is safe to assume a lack of grasshopper mentality as well!
You are a long way from sunny Suffolk, but other than the inspection fee, I owe you much beer anyway for helping me with this car and the e55 several years ago. I would get more detailed photos to you first of course to hopefully avoid any obvious fail points, but to be honest, the speed at which I work, I doubt I'll finish this for at least a couple of months! It's good fun though, so maybe a change in priority... I suppose I need only to tell the insurance company when I fill the tank for the first time.

@Gilbert

Thank you for the balanced view.

"4.4.4 Pipelines should not be installed where any part is permanently hidden from view and cannot be inspected regularly."

I'm going to go with the argument that the sill covers are easily removable, therefore the pipes are not "permanently" hidden.

[LPGC]

I'd have suggested the same regards reducers.

Many different ways of balancing pressure using 2 reducers.. Some vapour filters have 2x12 inlets and 2x12 outlets (very handy for this sort of thing!), could T like you said, some injector rails (and some gas distribution manifolds i.e. 12mm in 4x 6mm out) have removable blank at opposite end to gas inlet where another 12mm connector can be instead.. but I know you're using filters with 12mm in and 5mm or 6mm outlets as distributors.. So you'd probably be looking at fitting T's, Y's, or 2x12 filter.

Kidding about copper? Most of us use Faro pipe these days! Find the stuff and it's end fittings on any suppliers site.

There is a guy reasonably local to me that will inspect amateur installs, but I don't know anything about him. :

That's the thing really.. He could use common sense on grey areas and be unbiased regards whether he fitted it or someone else, or could be the opposite, while you might be charged similarly whether it passes or fails. There's 2 garages around here that would charge over the odds to inspect your car, then after (not if) they failed it they'd quote a massively inflated price to 'put it right'..

Don't feel in any way obligated to come here for purpose of inspection.. I recently said on another thread I advise on forum partly through goodwill and the warm feeling got from helping others (laughing but it's true) and partly because others read stuff I've written, take in that I know my stuff and come here for installs/repairs! I'm not a member of UKLPG so I have to pay someone else to do registrations, which are a sure thing on my say so, but this does mean I don't make much from an inspection anyway.

You are a long way from sunny Suffolk... I would get more detailed photos to you first of course

PM sent.

Simon