Boosted Natural Gas Car

[BlackandBlue]

I was doing some reading on compressed natural gas conversions for vehicles. Natural gas has many problems to overcome before mass adoption but from a boosted perspective it looks like a great fuel.

Pros
1. 130 octane
2. No pump needed
3. Doesn’t need to vaporize
4. Pressure can be raised for high consumption (hp)
5. Higher Air fuel ratio 16.8:1 vs 14.6:1 gas


Cons
1. Expensive compressors
2. No storage (mostly illegal to transport extra tanks)
3. Almost no available away from home except fill stations in some places.
4. Expensive conversion
5. Almost no history

Anyone ever thought of doing a conversion on a boosted car?

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[moffetts]

That would be an interesting but really pointless project. It’s a solution in search of a problem.

 

[Kahboom]

Could you use propane instead of natural gas? Propane tank is already under pressure, tanks can be swapped out lots of places, refill centers are at most truck stops and U-Haul centers.

 

[BlackandBlue]

Could you use propane instead of natural gas? Propane tank is already under pressure, tanks can be swapped out lots of places, refill centers are at most truck stops and U-Haul centers.

No propane is a different animal. It is low in the BTU department compared with gas and the octane is similar to ethanol.

 

[BlackandBlue]

That would be an interesting but really pointless project. It’s a solution in search of a problem.

The problem is octane limits and fuel density. Even C16 is only going to be slightly over 120 octane and cost a fortune.

Imagine being able to run 25psi with on a 12:1 engine with high timing with a fuel that is super cheap.

 

[moffetts]

What kind of build are you running that is out of octane on c16? Filling up with c16 may be more expensive than filling up with CNG, but even a fairly exotic race fuel like that is easier to find and transport than CNG is.

 

[5ohh_kenny]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.re...s_converted_for_use_with_natural_gas_fuel/amp

Checkout the abstract for that thesis. CNG converted gas vehicles see a 20% reduction in horsepower. It’s not all about octane.

Though there might be something to be said about the cooling effect afforded by using a fuel which expands as its injected (expanding gases have a cooling effect on their surroundings). At the end of the day you might as well just convert to methanol. You get the cooling effect and a less complicated conversion.

 

[Jay-rod427]

The problem is octane limits and fuel density. Even C16 is only going to be slightly over 120 octane and cost a fortune.

Imagine being able to run 25psi with on a 12:1 engine with high timing with a fuel that is super cheap.

Methanol is the answer. Cheap, and you nearly can't make it detonate.

 

[Whitedevil95]

My uncle works on Natural Gas powered busses and they hate it. The combustion temp of CNG is extremely high even compared to gasoline. This leads to problems with over heats and pistons. They have to work on these motors all the time and they deeply miss the diesel motor days.

 

[moffetts]

Methanol is the answer. Cheap, and you nearly can't make it detonate.

Methanol has several major problems, but cost/availability/power potential are non-issues for sure.

 

[BlackandBlue]

Well consensus is it’s a terrible idea.

 

[Burkey]

Could you use propane instead of natural gas? Propane tank is already under pressure, tanks can be swapped out lots of places, refill centers are at most truck stops and U-Haul centers.

Did you guys in the US never have the propane conversion craze like we did here in Australia? Although we call it LPG rather than propane.

 

[engineermike]

I believe in the US the use of LNG is on the rise. We’re already seeing ships and some OTR trucks convert. There’s a case for it but horsepower isn’t it.

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