Quote:
Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr
Most claims I see are of lower EGTs all around.
|
Yea the propane stuff seems to be full of mystery and not a whole lot of hard data on the subject. It can't be too hard to state diesel mpg + "mpg" for the propane and figure out the ratio they are running (roughly) and a fair idea if the system is overall better vs just running diesel.
EGT's seems to not be talked about too much, I think I only saw one mention that while pulling a trailer up a hill the person saw around 100f hotter EGT's with propane on.
If/when I plug away of the propane stuff, I might make a new thread dedicated about it to try to help clear up some of the lacking data on the subject.
The biggest thing I'm not 100% sure on is how to "tune" the propane levels. Pretty much everyone I see that claims success are running 10-20% propane. I've seen claims as high as 30% in one case. The best numbers I've seen from people work out at about 14-20% but there's not much for data in the 10% or lower range. One person with an NA IDI diesel stated the propane actually made their engine run worse and smoked more, I'm guessing the propane was using too much of the oxygen up or something, probably means propane in diesel is only for turboed or supercharged engines.
I guess the tune question is, what's a sign of too much besides potential spark knock noises or going to the point of damaging the engine? I'd assume EGT would increase with too much propane.
I kind of wish I had a little single cylinder diesel engine to test the propane logic on. Like say one that powers a generator so a consistent load can be put on it and EGT and such could be monitored at different levels, and get a fairly reproduce-able change in diesel usage. Of course measuring propane usage would be a little harder, probably would have to use a 1lb bottle and weigh it to get accurate usage. Would be interesting to use an engine like that to push the limits and see what exactly happens, like EGT's indicate the failure before damage happens and such. Of course this would be a NA engine, so the testing would be somewhat limited.
Maybe I can find a VW TDI parts car for cheap and toy around with that. Looked and cheapest atm appears to be $1000, kind of expensive to experiment on lol.