Car with smart hybrid LPG system to switch on LPG immediately during winter

[DomenicoLPG]

Hi all,

Is there any new hybrid car (petrol/LPG) that has capability to switch immediately to LPG during winter time cold start ?

Dacia ECO-G any improvement against older tce engine?

I have read some study long time a go, is there anything new in technology today ?

https://gazeo.com/automotive/technology ... 0,s,2.html

[LPGC]

It is possible but probably not worth the additional cost.

The system you linked to is just a pre-heater for the engine (and uses petrol to pre-heat the engine anyway).

Even if the engine and pressure reducer are pre-heated there will still be other aspects to address to get the engine to run properly and switch straight to LPG. The electronics (petrol engine ECU) may know the engine hasn't been run for X hours so presume the engine is cold and may still richen the mixture even though the coolant temp sensor reads warm temperature. The lambda sensors will still probably take (say) 30 seconds before they respond properly and during the 30 seconds the engine will run open loop mixture - the LPG calibration would need to be correct for starting the engine and running open loop during at least this time. Depending on what LPG injectors are fitted they may need changing to a different type that are less effected by working in cold conditions.

Instead of heating the whole engine it is possible to electrically preheat the LPG reducer and make changes to the way the petrol ECU reads engine coolant temperature, this would still involve addressing all of the above points but with the addition of making sure reducer temperature doesn't fall too much when cold engine coolant starts to flow through it (until the engine is warmer than the reducer coolant will quickly cool the reducer again as soon as the engine is cranked). It would be possible to address reducer cooling by fitting water flow control solenoid valves to stop cold water flowing through the reducer whilst maintaining electrical heating but it soon gets more involved.

Coincidentally I've been looking into methods of pre-heating LPG reducers recently, mini 40Watt 12Volt heaters that are used in 3d printers are inexpensive and many could be attached to a reducer to give it (say) 500 / 600Watts of preheating (obviously switched through a heavy current handling solenoid or several 30A relays). Would need a decent size battery to handle such setup though because it would have to preheat the reducer and then crank the cold engine - not much point fitting a system that saves 50p in fuel on cold mornings but costs £50 for a new battery every 100 days lol. Only looking into this as another feather in my cap because on most vehicles I convert I set the systems up to switch at 25C reducer temp anyway.