Refilling Gaz or other ordinary cylinders at the petrol station

[vyv_cox]

I think (and I will try and remember to check on this in the bible at work tonight) I'm right in saying that the Gaslow installations in question include a standard UK type filling point and do not use standard Butane / Propane systems but use a custom made and appropriately certified refillable cylinder (or in other words, a tank )

Yes, the fitting is the UK female screw thread. We have screw in adaptors for France, Italy and another for Scandinavia.

The Gaslow bottles are fairly special, containing one or more floats that shut off the supply at 80% full and provide a limited contents gauge.

 

[alahol2]

Really easy and works out at approx £4 per camping gaz 907 refill based on £19.99 for a 13 kg butane cylinder.

Here we go I knew I'd seen it somewhere.

 

[Bru]

Okayyy, didn't have a lot of time to spare last night (one of the freezers packed up, mega-panic trying to save the contents before they defrosted) but ...

We would definitely NOT authorise the LPG pump for any purpose other than filling a vehicle LPG installation

Or to put it another way, the hose has to be attached to a fitting on the vehicle not to any other fitting (e.g. an adapter fitted to the top of a bottle or a further length of hose)

Gaslow bottles are an unknown quantity but I suspect the answer to my query will be "no, they are bottles" - rather like the two different types of Jerry can it's not practical to differentiate between one type of bottle and another type from inside the building*

I'm not entirely clear on this myself but if the Gaslow bottle is installed in the camper (or whatever) with a fill point fitted to the exterior of the vehicle than as far as I can make out that would be permitted - how, when you get right down to it, could we tell the difference? (Although we might get a wee bit suspicious if a caravan was plugged in I guess )

* Yeah, in an ideal world the shop assistant would have the time and knowledge to don a hi-vis (sigh) and wander out on to the forecourt to check such things. In the real world they often have neither

This, by the way, is hypothetical as far as the site where I work is concerned as, to the best of anybodies recollection, nobody has ever tried to fill anything non-standard on the LPG. Or if they have, it hasn't been spotted

 

[KAL]

Here we go I knew I'd seen it somewhere.

That's the one! Works like a charm (hypothetically, so I'm told...)

 

[KAL]

Okayyy, didn't have a lot of time to spare last night (one of the freezers packed up, mega-panic trying to save the contents before they defrosted) but ...

We would definitely NOT authorise the LPG pump for any purpose other than filling a vehicle LPG installation

Or to put it another way, the hose has to be attached to a fitting on the vehicle not to any other fitting (e.g. an adapter fitted to the top of a bottle or a further length of hose)

Gaslow bottles are an unknown quantity but I suspect the answer to my query will be "no, they are bottles" - rather like the two different types of Jerry can it's not practical to differentiate between one type of bottle and another type from inside the building*

I'm not entirely clear on this myself but if the Gaslow bottle is installed in the camper (or whatever) with a fill point fitted to the exterior of the vehicle than as far as I can make out that would be permitted - how, when you get right down to it, could we tell the difference? (Although we might get a wee bit suspicious if a caravan was plugged in I guess )

* Yeah, in an ideal world the shop assistant would have the time and knowledge to don a hi-vis (sigh) and wander out on to the forecourt to check such things. In the real world they often have neither

This, by the way, is hypothetical as far as the site where I work is concerned as, to the best of anybodies recollection, nobody has ever tried to fill anything non-standard on the LPG. Or if they have, it hasn't been spotted

We DO like hypothetical; so exercising for the mind

 

[pelmetman]

Yes, the fitting is the UK female screw thread. We have screw in adaptors for France, Italy and another for Scandinavia.

The Gaslow bottles are fairly special, containing one or more floats that shut off the supply at 80% full and provide a limited contents gauge.

We have the Alugas system which is very similar to Gaslow, although in theory we can get the gas with just 5% tax, I suspect the hassle of finding and driving to a supplier would soon be outweighed by the cost in diesel.........Auto gas still works out cheaper than Calor gas......and especially camping Gaz

 

[saltylegs]

Does anyone know whether it's possible to get hold of a suitable adaptor that would allow the refilling of an ordinary butane cylinder at the autogas refilling points in a petrol station?

If such adapters are available, would the station allow it?

Anyone any knowledge or experience of such?

All hypothetical of course...

NO.

autogas in mainly propane and not suitable for a butane gaz cylinder.

 

[crisjones]

Filled our UK Propane bottles at the BP station just outside Lagos, Portugal over the winter using an adapter that can be bought of Ebay (search for propane autogas adapter).

Asked the staff before filling and they had no problem with it - response was, yes all the camper vans do it!!

The adapters tell you how many litres of gas to put into the cylinders based on the kg capacity, the cylinder must be empty before you start. Frankly if you cannot follow the simple instructions supplied with the adapter then you should not be doing it. It is no more difficult than changing a cylinder on the boat.

I appreciate that H&S and other Regs in the UK may make the practice illegal and I think the same applies in France. Portugal seems to be OK with it and I have heard reports that Italy and Greece are also OK with the practice.

 

[vyv_cox]

I appreciate that H&S and other Regs in the UK may make the practice illegal and I think the same applies in France. Portugal seems to be OK with it and I have heard reports that Italy and Greece are also OK with the practice.

We had no problems having bottles refilled in Portugal. However in Italy some forecourt people were reluctant to fill even our Gaslow, installed in the vehicle. They would definitely not fill stand alone bottles. Autogas is pretty unusual in Greece, I believe there are a few stations around Athens that keep it but we have only ever seen one between Igoumenitsa and Piraeas.