LPG Availability around the Solent

barryassheton said:
Hi, I am strongly considering an LPG conversion on my petrol engines but I am having trouble locating a filling pontoon in the Solent area. Does anywhere know where it can be bought for propulsion use.

Thanks Baz
Click to expand...

You have just answered your own question, dont waste your money on conversion, its not that readily available as it never really took off.
 
aquapower said:
You have just answered your own question, dont waste your money on conversion, its not that readily available as it never really took off.
Click to expand...


Thanks, Its a shame as the price of petrol is getting silly for both marine and auto and diesel isn't much better. There has to be a better alternative. I think I will have to keep searching.

Thanks Baz
 
barryassheton said:
Thank you, We are refurbishing our boat at the moment and wanted to make sure we could get LPG before spending money to convert to LPG use.
Click to expand...

I had mine converted back in around 1995 when LPG was still growing.

The conversion paid for itself in 2 seasons (so that was worth it) But that was way back when the number of filling points were growing. Also the conversion was very expensive and poor quality as the marine conversion market was new and nothing like cars.

Now, I think you'd struggle to fill up anywhere.

You could get a car conversion done on it, but you need freshwater cooling as the salt water will destroy the vaporiser. You would also need a petrochemical detector (a sniffer in essence) linked to the blower and an alarm (if you get a leak on a car it blows away - in a boat it would settle in the bilge).

If you are a trailable boat, then you could fit the autogas filler and fill up at thousands of garages, but if the boat stays in the water, it's a non-starter I think.

Having said that - if fuel keeps rising and someone massive got behind it (Calor were supposed to help with the original launch but it never took off) then it might come back, but I can't see it in the near future.
 
I've run my last two Land Rovers on LPG and whilst the first one was an early, relatively crude implementation, the current one is much better and uses a much more modern sequential injection. I get a cost equivalent of 20mpg around town and 30mpg on motorway - much better than petrol (12-18mpg).

As I'm currently rebuilding a 21' V8 cuddy, I've obviously thought about fitting LPG and the fact that I will trail the boat plus Torquay also has quayside LPG makes a good case for it. The downsides for me are the risk of fumes, the marine environment (corrosion), cost and additional weight. My current engine is a 5L carburettor variant and that means spraying vaporised LPG into the air intake as per my first Land Rover - this is both less efficient in my experience and I feel, higher risk given the vapour is heavier than air. If your motor is injected and you have access to LPG in your local port then it maybe worthwhile - particularly for twin installations! I haven't yet ruled out entirely and if I were to re-engine with an injected 5.7, I might consider... I do agree however that as it becomes more popular, government greed will inevitably erode any savings - no matter how much cleaner it is. :rolleyes:
 
Be better in the long term by replacing the engine / engines with the new mpi they are 20-30% more efficient and the benefit of new engines. I would not waste your time with gas, it will also hurt the resale value of the boat as no one wants them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top