Lister Engine Forum

Alternative fuels => Other Fuels => Topic started by: justsomeguy on January 17, 2006, 06:51:04 AM

Title: Propane Injection
Post by: justsomeguy on January 17, 2006, 06:51:04 AM
Has anyone tried this on a Listerclone or other small diesel?  I see that many places sell kits for smaller diesel trucks and claim all sorts of more power, less fuel used, etc.  I know of a guy that uses propane injection on a ford power stroke, and it did increase his horsepower on the dyno by quite a bit.

Being that the listers are naturally aspirated, and some are indirect injection, I figure that might not be the best application for propane, but I thought I'd ask.

This site explaines how/why it works.

http://www.dieselsmoke.com/info/propaneinjection.html
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: pa73 on January 22, 2006, 03:16:32 PM
I read the linked article and wondered if LPG injection could be used for an instantaneous power boost.

Some members run an 8/1 or 12/1 to have reserve power in their genset. Others have observed that a 6/1 cannot start their air compressor. Would it be possible to eliminate the need for reserve power as follows....

Your electrical power needs lead you to specify an 8/1, but in reality you only need 2-3KW for 98% of the time. You fit your engine with an accurate tachometer and linked LPG kit. When speed drops, LPG is added to the intake. So you can add a near-instantantaneous 1-2KW to your engine with LPG injection. And 98% of the time you have a right-sized engine with the good fuel economy.

Just thinking aloud. I haven't a clue how to do it, although I ran a BMW 730i on LPG for 3 years.

Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kyradawg on January 22, 2006, 05:06:45 PM
Injecting gas is the wrong way to go. First its refined from crude oil you know the stuff our young brothers and sisters are dying for in Irac :'(. Any form of energy that increases the death toll (people or vegetation) in my book should be avoided at all/any costs if possible. Secondly when your propane tank is empty the fun's all over no more power boost. An on demand power boost should be non depleatable if its to be relied on (tanks empty blizard outside). For a power boost that is allways there on a as needed basis (or continually) you could use the magnetic clutch engaged m-45 supercharger off of a slk,c230 ect mercedes that can be had for less than $100 on ebay. The clutch could be engaged with a micro switch connected to the governer and only come into play when excesive load is applied. Peace&Love :D, Darren
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: justsomeguy on January 22, 2006, 08:20:01 PM
That supercharger idea wouldn't give any more power, it would actually cause a net power loss.  In a diesel, just increasing air doesn't increase your power.  You need to increase fueling to increase your power.

To make any diesel "power burst"  all one has to do is increase the upper fueling limit.  However, there's nothing to limit the length of the burst.  Eventually, somethign will break, melt, burn up, fly apart, etc.


Power burst is an interesting concept though. I'll have to put some thought in to it.  It seems to be a very easy problem to solve.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kyradawg on January 22, 2006, 09:29:37 PM


P.S. homemade methane/biogas is a really cool idea!

Peace&Love :D, Darren
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kpgv on January 24, 2006, 03:30:12 AM
Hi pa73,
To cut thru the "unnecessary" political BS, IMPO, to use "superchargers" or "fuel enrichment boosters" as an occasional power boost is the wrong way to go, with respect to reliability and dependability. I'm not saying it can't be done, but why not run a higher HP engine, or consider applying one of these horsepower boosters full time.

Kevin
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: Procrustes on January 24, 2006, 04:07:54 AM
To cut thru the "unnecessary" political BS, IMPO, to use "superchargers" or "fuel enrichment boosters" as an occasional power boost is the wrong way to go, with respect to reliability and dependability. I'm not saying it can't be done, but why not run a higher HP engine, or consider applying one of these horsepower boosters full time.

Kevin

Thanks for mentioning that.  I was under the impression that turbochargers and superchargers were for boosting the horsepower of an engine relative to it's size and weight, for instance for racing or fuel economy.  Along this line of thought, if you want more horsepower from a stationary engine, what you really want is a larger engine.  However I have seen a factory supercharged stationary Detroit 3-53, which I'm unable to explain.

Perhaps the complexity of a turbocharger would make more sense for a high altitude installation.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kpgv on January 24, 2006, 06:31:03 AM
Dear Procrustes,

With all due respect,
I was responding to rp73's considering a "part time and/or occasional" HP boost for an intermittent and/or occasional high load "booster". Please note, I didn't say it couldn't be done. Without a well defined AND executed sensory AND application SYSTEM with ROCK SOLID feedback loops, or FULL time manual and eyeball monitoring,  part time SUPERCHARGING in any form is a LOOSER. :P

Kevin
 
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: Procrustes on January 24, 2006, 07:05:19 AM
I was responding to rp73's considering a "part time and/or occasional" HP boost for an intermittent and/or occasional high load "booster". Please note, I didn't say it couldn't be done. Without a well defined AND executed sensory AND application SYSTEM with ROCK SOLID feedback loops, or FULL time manual and eyeball monitoring,  part time SUPERCHARGING in any form is a LOOSER. :P

My apologies, I somehow thought you were saying that in general turbo and supercharges don't make a lot of sense for stationary engines.  I believe that, but the stationary supercharged 3-53 I mentioned makes me worry that I'll soon be disabused.

I didn't mean to imply that supercharging a Lister is impossible, nor did I believe that you said so.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: pa73 on January 24, 2006, 10:04:49 AM
Hi pa73,
To cut thru the "unnecessary" political BS, IMPO, to use "superchargers" or "fuel enrichment boosters" as an occasional power boost is the wrong way to go, with respect to reliability and dependability. I'm not saying it can't be done, but why not run a higher HP engine, or consider applying one of these horsepower boosters full time.

Kevin

It is more complex, and introduces potential reliability problems. However, having excess capacity for 98% of your runtime is inefficient. It is a choice between complexity and relative inefficiency.

However, from this discussion and some  google-based research I've understood that the power increase is probably minimal. Nice idea, but not one I will take forward. Thanks to all for their contributions.


Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kyradawg on January 24, 2006, 08:43:05 PM
 Peace&Love :D, Darren
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kpgv on January 24, 2006, 10:16:47 PM
Hi Dawg,
Please don't take offense, just my opinions, and "looser" is probably too strong a word.
For me, that sort of complexity on a super simple machine like these is too much of a dependability problem.
It all depends what one is trying to do. I'm sure someone out there has a 25/2 that needs more horsepower to do the job.
That fellow (Dancause) that turbo'ed the 6/1 in Canada built a nice, simple, well performing rig. A free floating turbo is about as simple and dependable as supercharging gets. It's always "on" and ready. The sacrifice is the extra belt to the oil pump and the extra oil hoses. The full time belt driven blower has the extra belt problem as well. The old GMC's drive the blower internally (as I remember) and run all the time. Adding and tuning a load sensing clutch device to the blower drive just sounds like another layer of unnecessary complication unless there is simply no higher output engine available, or maybe it needs to be "portable".
My Wife thinks I have lost my mind lately running around testing "draws" on the appliances and other circuts around the house. I get that there can (will) be possible overload situations, and in a perfect world, everyone buys the perfect and adequate engine and head the first time, but in the real world, there will invariably be the need for more power.
Wouldn't it be simpler to find or devise a load shed or load sequencer to manage the situation?
One thing I DO know for sure is this thing had better do what I've told my Wife it will, and it had better not have much "down time"! ;D

Kevin

     
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: rgroves on January 25, 2006, 12:08:25 AM

Kevin, if you're just trying to accomodate peak loads, you might consider adding a small bank of batteries and an inverter.  Xantrex makes a number of inverters that will simultaneously charge batteries, parallel their output to the AC input, and even act as a transfer switch so you can connect them to the grid as well. Good quality inverters can surge to 2 or 3 times their rated max power. And they're designed to do all these things, without you having to kludge more complexity onto an elegantly simple engine.

There's one other nice thing about adding an inverter and batteries.  Your family doesn't end up sitting in the dark while you're maintaining the engine during an outage.

Not a very gear-grinding solution, but it makes a lot of sense if you're just trying to back up house electricity.

Feel free to email me and I'll recommend some more reading and an excellent book.


>My Wife thinks I have lost my mind lately running around testing "draws" on the appliances and other circuts around the house. I get that there can (will) be possible >overload situations, and in a perfect world, everyone buys the perfect and adequate engine and head the first time, but in the real world, there will invariably be the need >for more power.
>Wouldn't it be simpler to find or devise a load shed or load sequencer to manage the situation?
>One thing I DO know for sure is this thing had better do what I've told my Wife it will, and it had better not have much "down time"! ;D

Kevin

     
Quote
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: justsomeguy on January 27, 2006, 09:00:44 PM
I'll ask again.  So, Is anyone using Propane injection with a Listeroid or other small diesel?
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: BruceM on January 28, 2006, 03:51:58 PM
From what I've read, propane injection in a normally aspirated engine is only good for a 15% increase in power.  That's not enough to do much with.

Some hybrid technology (inverter/battery boost for peak loads) is likely the most efficient solution as it allows the minimum engine for the job.

I wonder if the crank bearings on the 6/1 could handle a second set of flywheels???  More flywheel is the antique solution and sometimes they're good ones.

Bruce


Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: SHIPCHIEF on January 28, 2006, 04:37:09 PM
Perhaps add the new flywheel to something else?
The gen head turns a higher RPM, (1800) so a smaller flywheel would carry the same kinetic energy. Put it next to the driven pulley.
Design for safety, use Machinery's Handbook for formulas.

About propane injection; isn't it expensive? Propane is only desired as a combustion catalyst to liberate more heat from the diesel fuel. Because we talk about using the cheapest fuel we can Jin up, propane as a primary fuel is out on cost considerations. If it does not assist combustion of low grade fuel in Precup engines, then I don't see a future for it here.
Scott E
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: justsomeguy on January 28, 2006, 08:02:43 PM
Propane in Diesel Engines: It's not meant to be the exclusive fuel, but to help the main fuel burn better, cleaner, more complete, more efficient.  Not only do you get the BTUs out of the propane, but the usable BTU content of the liquid fuel goes up also, due to more complete combustion.  It's not meant to be a primary fuel.  As a matter of fact, you can't use more than a certain % propane, as it's octane it's high enough.  The idea is that you get more power/heat out of your diesel fuel than you add in as propane.  Enough so to more than pay for the propane.

"Added horsepower" is what sells the propane kits.  The real reason for propane injection is "increased combustion efficiency."   Try to sell a $300-$900 kit, with the need for a propane tank to be also periodically filled, to a guy pulling a horse trailer with his F-350 only using the marketing term "increased combustion efficiency."

Let me spell it out this way:

Looking at raw economics here.... getting the maximum heat/power output, for the minimum $$$ fuel input, what's cheaper?

Running 100% used motor oil and tearing down the motor regularly to clean out the carbon mess?

Running 90% used oil (free!) and 3-10% propane ($) ?  (possibly without a carbon mess)

Running 90% die$el fuel , and 10% used motor oil?

Running 90% die$el fuel and 10% propane, and getting 110% BTU content out of the die$el fuel, plus the BTU content of the propane.

Running 100% Biodie$el (Opportunity cost... because it can be sold for same value as die$el fuel... therefore it costs the same!)

Running SVO and dealing with collection, chunks of grease, water and other crap, plus the cost of modifications to start/stop run the engine on it.

Running 40% used motor oil, 30% SVO, 15% die$el fuel, 10% Natural gas, 5% propane, (Maybe this is the magic fuel combination with no tear downs for cleaning, ever!)

Running 90% Natural gas, 5% Biodiesel, 5% dino die$el

I'm after the "magic combination" of the cheapest fuel possible that can be used without extra work to be performed on these engines.

So, I toss these questions out there to gather information to see if anyone else has tried any of this. Most on this board seem to be very bright, and very innovative.  There's a *LOT* of information in the collective group of Lister owners.  Those who get a Lister "for fun" and grid connect it, or just use it at a remote cabin so they can have a TV set and not have to use gas lanterns have the luxury of being able to experiment. 

Those off grid would be understandably less prone to do anything that might jeopardize the reliability of their only prime mover.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kyradawg on January 29, 2006, 02:11:06 AM
Justsomeguy,

The raw ecconomics of propane for me is cost prohibitive. First you must purchase all of the plumbing parts like jets, mixer, hoses, tank, regulators, and solenoids.

Then there is the never ending gas purchase $2.00+/gal around here. If your basing your goals on cost gaseous injection wont come out the winner.

The inlet tract of the lister is already severly compremised meaning there is barely enough oxygen in the chamber for even mildly efficent combustion as it is.

Adding another geseous fuel further compounds the problem of insufficient oxygen available to the already overly rich combustion process.

For you to obtain the gains you would like addtional oxygen will need to be supplied to the combustion process ie super or turbocharging but at that point why add gas?

As far as the carbon deposits from waste oil just inject a little water into the chamber when it vaporises the micro droplets blast (steam clean) the carbon off of the surfaces. No need to inject gas.

Peace&Love :D, Darren

P.S Just because we can use fossil fuels doesnt mean we have to!
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: albany dbd on March 19, 2006, 04:13:38 PM
Hi im new to this forum  but i have a bit of experiance with diesels and also turbos and propane. i have a cummins and have propane and a turbo. the turbo would be as reliable as anything thing else on the lister considering it would never be pushed near the top of its safe range. as for propane it will make more power more heat and use more o2 to burn hense the need for a turbo or supercharger. the turbo is a much better choice for a diesel. the supercharger uses crank power to run and its using it all the time. the old jimmys needed a blower to get the combusted gas out . they were 2 stroke.to tell if you need to force feed your motor just load it till it starts smoking and then give it a shot of air from say a shop vac and see if it clears up. thats about like having a turbo at about 2 psi of boost. youll get a bit more power and runn cleaner at max power. there are very few diesels out there that would not benifit from turbos. the trick is to find a small enough to work on a lister. im still looking.  derik
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: GuyFawkes on March 19, 2006, 04:41:41 PM
the trick is to find a small enough to work on a lister. im still looking.  derik


no, the trick is to find a turbo that will work on a 1.5 litre single cylinder doing 650 rpm
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: hotater on April 08, 2006, 05:04:26 PM
 I'll be adding a propane injector soon for carbon control.  It'll take some experimentation to figure out how much for how long and how often, but it'll save time and effort in the long run.
  I'm NOT doing it for power, but for cleanliness.  Those with WVO/WMO aspirations might take note.

Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: SHIPCHIEF on April 09, 2006, 07:29:21 AM
I caught Rock and Bullwinkle looking in the Professer's WayBackMachine,
http://utterpower.com/turbo_6_1.htm
We discussed turbocharging and the Dacuase 6/1. Kradawg really ran wild with it, but I think the basic simple turbo shown on George's page would compliment your propane injection very well. Might add 1 Kw, and I *Know* you could use it.  ;)
Propane as an engine cleaner is very interesting! Would alittle water injection help at the same time? or is the Propane exhaust byproduct (water vapor) already doing that?
Scott E
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: Ironworks on April 09, 2006, 11:25:39 AM
I'm pretty sure you use the propane injected in liquid form and not vapor maybe this cleans the carbon away.  My dad had a propane powered truck and it used liquid not vapor.  We tore the engine apart one time and it looked brand new.  As far as a turbo for a Lister type engine...seems like any motorcycle turbo would work.  During the mid 80's most of the Japanese bike producers were making a turbo model. I think Lister engines have about the same displacements as a Harley and I have seen guys take turbo chargers off of Chevy Corvairs and use them on v-twins.  I just picked up a turbo at a sale for a international tractor I am tinkering with.  I was wondering why you cant use any turbo as long as you have a wastegate that will keep the boost pressure where you want it.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: GuyFawkes on April 09, 2006, 01:52:13 PM
Many years ago now when turbos were new on motorcycles, Honda decided to turbo the CX500, a 500 cc transverse mounted water cooled pushrod vee twin.

Honda talked a lot of bollocks about choosing the CX because the staggered exhaust pulses from a vee twin made it a challenge to turbo properly, and if they could do that right they could do anything.

While there is a lot of truth in that, so turboing a big single like a lister is a worst case scenario for a turbo, that wasn't the real reason.

A turbo is literally a heat pump, it takes the heat from the exhaust gases and recycles it to pressurise the intake, this dramatically increasing the amount of heat going through the engine, in Honda's case that meant turbo = necessity for a water cooled motor, which left them with a choice between the sort of sporty CX500 and the bus that was the GL1000 gold wing flat four.

Apart from the fact turboing the "bus" would have been a joke, the gold wing engine has always been known for a weak crankshaft, so it wasn't a good candidate.

----------------------

As far as listers go.....

the "worst possible" scenario for a turbo of being a big single it mitigated somewhat by the fact it is a fairly constant rpm, so, If I was going to turbo a lister.

1/ lower the compression ratio, 14:1 is about right, whether you do this with a gasket or whatever is up to you.

2/ low compression and zero turbo boost at cranking speeds means you need to do something about cold starting, glow plugs should do.

3/ turbos need an exceptionally good lube system, particularly on shutdown to remove heat, so you need a separate lube system because I wouldn't mix a lister primary lube system (esp on an listeroid) with a turbo, pref mechanically driven, when an automatic electric pump to run for 60 second when you shut the rack to close her down. This lube system will need an oil cooler too.

4/ turbos like smooth flow, so a plenum chamber on the engine exhaust / turbo input side would be good, Ideally about 1.5 litres in capacity to match the engine capacity

5/ turbos lose one hell of a lot of efficiency if you run them without an intercooler on the engine intake / turbo output side to increase the density of the charge, so you have to uprate the entire coolant circuit and add a circulating pump.

observations.

supercharging is good for about 40% boost in power.

6 BHP x 40% = 2.4 BHP

so you have a reasonable 2.4 BHP boost to 8.4 BHP, but, you are going to consume 1 BHP of that to power your new lube circuit and the beefed up cooling circuit for the intercooler, so 7.4 BHP usable.

you are going to do a ___SHIT___ lot of work on your lister and forever remove any semblance of rugged simplicity and dependability, and a fair wad of cash, for an extra 1.4 BHP

far better to properly utilise the 6 BHP you have on a heavier duty cycle, trouble starting that dynamic load? double your flywheel mass.... or better still work on the load so it starts on a dump and not direct on line driving a load, eg a blow by on a compressor.. even cheap disposable electric compressors have them to purge the system and allow the electric motor to spin up before putting the full compressor load on it.

....................................

turbos aren't toys, if you want a real life definition of "a sheet of flame that burns everything it touches" just watch a hot turbo blow its oil seals, you have a 100,000 rpm hot air gun that is suddenly fed hot lube oil under pressure, it won't be a true self sustaining turbine where the exhaust gas drives the other side of the turbo, but it don't need to be, your still running lister will provide that impetus..... that madman on the utterpower site at least had his turbo unit sat outdoors, miles away from anything and miles away from anything more combustible that snow covered timber

propane injection ain't a toy either, how many of you have sat down and done the sums, as opposed to mulling it over over a few beers? are you going to direct inject it to the head? if so have you worked out where you'd like to be sitting when that home built system goes wrong and you have combustion pressures and temperatures feeding back up that live propane line, past all those safety features you didn't install, right up to the tank?

guys, pressurised gases of ANY kind are bloody dangerous, when they are HOT as well they are incredibly dangerous, I simply cannot overstate this, even obviously safe things like compressed air and combusted exhaust gases are in fact bloody dangerous.

ask the marine engineer boys on here about minute amounts of oil, like half a cup, in really large systems like 30,000 ton ship engine rooms, nothing more than compressed air and some exhaust gas and you get an explosion that ripped the engine room apart and killed half a dozen men, including all the engineers.

ask the welders on here about doing something that is obviously safe and mixing obviously innocuous things like deciding to put some lube oil or grease on the threads of your oxygen tank to lube it and protect it

------------------------

the nature and chemistry of things change dramatically when you add pressure and / or increase temperature, you KNOW this, because that funny liquid that you can drop a lit cigarette in powers your listers, do not mess about with these things unless you want to be injured or killed.

if you want to play with something go learn it first, and you won't learn it here unless there is someone here expert at it, I've done engineering and marine engineering since I could walk in the sense I grew up on and around steam and electric dredges and so on, but there's still lots of things I know dick about, propane + internal combustion is one of em, sure, I've seen and driven propane powered fork lifs, and seen and touched massive propane engines that run off the burn off on oil rigs, but I don't know enough to even consider injecting propane into a lister....  _____ESPECIALLY_____ as a liquid.

--------------------------


lot of you guys in the states are moaning about EPA laws and certifications, what you think will happen when a listeroid blows and people die?

you think there will be a proper enquiry that takes time and money and arrives at the truth and puts it down to darwin?
or you think the result will be a recommendation for tigher controls and more legislation?

this particularly applies to those of you (like me) planning on running stuff in urban enviornments....

perhaps hotater can get away with a scenario like happened to that guy in australia where his genuine lister start-o-matic threw a flywheel, and it went through the shed wall and fetched up intact in a creek bed two kilometers away, most of us, me included, will end up with property (other peoples) damage and probably people killed, a visit from the police and restrictions on what everyone else can do in that scenario.

------------------------------

you buy listers beacuse they are not horrible little 3300 rpm stinkpots, but because they are not horrible little 3300 rpm stinkpots you really cannot stand around them when they blow and go "wow" and upload the video to some website, there are HUGE amounts of energy stored in a running lister, and familiarity breeds contempt.
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: hotater on April 09, 2006, 03:33:00 PM
Guy said--

"...if you want to play with something go learn it first, ......."

THat, Sir, is absolute BS, backwards, anti-creative, counterproductive and rediculous....in MY opinion.  <edited severeal times downward>

To "play" with something is the very essence of learning because there is *interest* in it. 

I've been a teacher and I've seen those timid about experimenting and enquiring and instead studied the information gathered by others.....no thanks.  All they do is spew the stuff they assume to be right because somebody else 'said' it was.

There was never better teachers than those that said, 'Here's the basics, go do it and holler when you need help'.

There's more to be learned from the parts that fall out of the sky than those that never did *anything*.  It's good not to get hurt, but me and all my fellow rocket, gun, cannon, land-mine, motorscooter, zip-line building friends spent time in the emercency room and one lost a finger, but we sure laughed at the science teacher that obviosly had never gone past reading about rocketry and making explosives at home and slingshots from bicyle innertubes and a fence stretcher....

4-H motto-  Learn by Doing

Re: The turboed Honda crotch-rocket---   I think that was the first motor vehicle in the USA that insurance companies refused to write after the first year of sales.  I have a friend that has one and I've ridden it.  It doesn't have a throttle, it has a trigger.   :o :o
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: GuyFawkes on April 09, 2006, 05:21:47 PM
Guy said--

"...if you want to play with something go learn it first, ......."

THat, Sir, is absolute BS, backwards, anti-creative, counterproductive and rediculous....in MY opinion.  <edited severeal times downward>

To "play" with something is the very essence of learning because there is *interest* in it. 

I've been a teacher and I've seen those timid about experimenting and enquiring and instead studied the information gathered by others.....no thanks.  All they do is spew the stuff they assume to be right because somebody else 'said' it was.

There was never better teachers than those that said, 'Here's the basics, go do it and holler when you need help'.

I _do_ know what you mean, and I have a lot of sympathy for that viewpoint.

I look back at myself and my memories and can find plenty of instances of "I did _what_!!!" but like you say I got away with it.

Looking back I'd have to say I got away with it because of a lot of things, partially dumb luck, partially I'd absorbed enough smarts along the way to not do anything _too_ stupid (the fertiliser bomb pushed the envelope though - nother story)

Now I'm older, maybe that gives me a different perspective, and it is this.

I've got a 19 year old girl, her job is hotel receptionist, she's studying her degree in management at the same time, (she's not my child BTW so this isn't anything about wanting a son and making a daughter into a tomboy)

Lots of people will say there's lots of things she doesn't need to know, the world has moved on since we grew up.

Last autumn I taught her how to strip, prep, prime, paint and finish a motorcycle, yes it wasn't perfect, but it was her first job and you have to learn from mistakes, point was it was ALL her own hands and work, I just sat there and talked her though each stage.

http://www.surfbaud.co.uk/TR1/

here's an example of her metal polishing

(http://www.surfbaud.co.uk/TR1/pix2/alternator%20cover.jpg)

and here's an example of her paintwork

(http://www.surfbaud.co.uk/TR1/pix2/tank.jpg)

not too shabby for a 19 year old girl who'd never done anything like it before.

just last week we were saying I'd teach her to weld, not because she'd ever need to, but she might, you never know.

now here's the point.

she isn't stupid by any means, but she came out of school at sixteen knowing nothing, and I don't mean nothing compared to an adult, but nothing compared to us when we were sixteen, schools and life got all politically correct and health and safety concious, kids don't mix chemicals in a chemistry lab any more, nobody ignites potassium or magnesium, noone makes producer gas and lights it, metal shops and wood shops are a thing of the past, they just have "science" classes.

when the kids get home they don't get out to play in case bands of roaming paedophiles abduct them, or in case they step on an HIV infected needle that bands of roaming addicts have left behind, or in case they get killed by a car, or in case they fall in the river and drown, or in case they fall out of the tree and break their backs.

kids aren't exposed to casual enviornmental dangers, so they don't learn to gauge them and make value judgements.

I walked over a mile to school from the age of seven, that was in the country too and nobody in the country needs to be told farm land is a heap more dangerous than town and parks.

Today kids in their teens are taken to and from school by their parents in vehicles.

There is no corporal punishment in schools.

We are turning out generations of people who have never felt physical pain and never learned the lessons associated with it.

Every week I pass someone changing a car tyre, can't remember the last time I saw someone with the spare sat under the vehicle body in case the jack collapsed.

It might be that nobody on there forums or reading them falls into this category, it might be that everyone here has the ability to make valid risk assessments, if that is the case then these forums are a definite self selected sub-set of society.

If these forums aren't that sub-set of society, then we will have people here who can't make valid risk assessments, and there is a hell of a lot of opportunity for a standard lister to hurt you, never mind a heath robinson one with aftermarked home made add-ons that were never intended to be so.

Speaking as an englishman, there is a shit load of things that I can no longer do, or only do subject to obtaining some expensive licence, most of these restrictions came about as a result of other people who couldn't make valid risk assessments.

In 5 years time I don't want some jobsworth coming around and telling me I can't run my lister without wire cage enclosing all the rotating parts and various inspection certificated because some yahoo couldn't make a valid risk assessment and killed someone.

my 2c
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: Stan on April 09, 2006, 07:27:56 PM
I've got to laugh when I hear someone from the "land of litigation" say something like "There was never better teachers than those that said, 'Here's the basics, go do it and holler when you need help'.  From what I hear from my teachers union is that the first thing you guys hear is a holler from a lawyer!
From what our "shop" teachers tell us, They are rapidly progressing toward the "don't touch anything that might hurt you" program,  because of idiotic lawsuits being launched because someone got a blood blister.  The rocket program was scrapped long ago for that reason.

As an ex-science teacher, we aren't being allowed to let our students touch about 50% of the chemicals that we used to for that very reason.
Stan
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: GerryH on April 10, 2006, 12:11:33 AM
Hi Justsomeguy,
As this thread has dis-integrated, I thought I'd quit lurking and add further confusion to the subject. The answer is obvious. No one is yet using propane. Kyradowg will be spinning on about Iraq and Hotater will try it out.
In the trucking industry it has been an old trick in the 50's and 60's to stuff a propane torch into the air cleaner intake and feed propane in for boost so you could pass another truck. This resulted in denial of warrantee when the blown engine came into the shop with a propane smell on the bent parts.
There is one thing being done now that makes sense. Propane, as someone mentioned, aids combustion and prevents carbon buildup. Why? because it is full of hydrogen. Don't argue, when it burns it makes water vapor. Some trucks are now running a electroytic cell using spare 12volt power to break down water and feed the oxygen and hydrogen into the engine and are achieving a large increase in fuel milage. When you spend 8000 dollars on fuel in a month and get a 15% gain for keeping water in a cell this is attractive. There is a company in Lethbridge, Alberta--don't have the website at the moment-- selling this stuff for commercial trucks.
The only other sensible comment on here was if you want more power, get a bigger engine. Or use a battery bank and backfeed the gasses from charging into the air intake.

Hydrogen won't ignite from compression, but when the fuel ignites, the hydrogen flame propagation is very fast, (the flame front is way ahead of the diesel) and the fuel droplets(little flaming balls) are flying into a sea of fire, instead of half of them not properly burning and getting stuck on the cylinder wall or out the exhaust as soot.

Gerry
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: fuddyduddy on April 10, 2006, 12:58:29 AM
Sorry, cannot continue to read the crap being posted here and not say anything.

My experiences are using my devices, put together myself.

After personally using propane fumigation with diesel-powered vehicles for more than 40,000 miles, can tell you this:
if you do not try to boost the living sh** out of an engine, you can run it on non-turbocharged engines and get 5-10% more power, but more important, you will clean all carbon out of it, and it will run smoother and quieter.

In a turbocharged engine, if you use a "high-pressure" fumigation system, and inject into the inlet AFTER the turbo, you will want to use a throttle switch and solenoid at a minimum to turn the propane on and off.  My 6.5 TD Chev really likes propane, and it makes 20-30% more power at best guess, using it. When pulling the 37' fifth wheel, the weight is around 21,000 total pounds, and the diesel mileage using about 1 gallon of propane per 100 miles of road travel goes from 9-11 MPG to 12-13.8. The transmission is an NV450, 5-speed stick, and you gain about 1/2 gear with the propane on. Up a long steep hill, this means 45-55 MPH in fourth, instead of 35-40 in third gear!!

For those who say it will blow up an engine, etc, I say this; yup, you can also floorboard your car throttle in town and leave the pedal flloored and see how far you can go.

Since I am old and slow, have no problem blowing up engines, etc. The approach is, to gradually feed more, and an engine will ABSOLUTELY let you know when it has enough; it makes very unhappy sounds!!! Then I set the system to deliver less than this under max injection.

My first test doing this was with a Nissan LD28, 6 cylinder with seven main bearings, so knew it had lots of strength. With it, tested twice, adding more and more propane until the engine died, and it did not "blow" either time I tried it.  Ran it for several years using a bit of propane. That engine had almost 400,000 miles on it whe I got rid of it, and had never been rebuilt!

 Put boost and EGT gauges on the Chev pickup to monitor what was happening better. With propane on, the EGT will run 40-50 degrees hotter, but you can let off the throttle a bit and it goes down, and the boost does also. If you add water injection  at this point it does not seem to help a lot, but DOES cool the EGT a bit. A little water goes a long ways.

Yes, have exchanged emails with others who have done and are doing this, and our experiences are all about the same.

It is a practical, inexpensive way to keep an engine clean inside and eliminate wet-stacking and carbon buildup using "alternative" fuels.
 



Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: GerryH on April 10, 2006, 01:32:23 AM
fuddyduddy;
You are right about using propane properly. In the early days I referred to these guys used it with no proper metering. The were the Cummins 250 and the Detroit 6-71's. I have seen one in a wrecking yard, a 20 pound bottle hooked with a valve and 1/4 inch line and no regulator to the intake. The engine still ran they said.
An engine on propane can last a very long time as it burns clean. In a Lister application for the popular quest for more power, I think it is a waste. To do it right is not a simple process.

Gerry
Title: Re: Propane Injection
Post by: kyradawg on April 11, 2006, 07:12:35 PM


Peace&Love :D, Darren