TriniTuner.com  |  Latest Event:  

Forums

Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Tuning advice, problems and troubleshooting

Moderator: 3ne2nr Mods

User avatar
hong kong phooey
punchin NOS
Posts: 2961
Joined: July 10th, 2006, 8:37 am
Location: ah lorse

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby hong kong phooey » June 19th, 2011, 5:08 pm

Red Dawg I have read these comments and i dont understand what is done with your air intake.
I am just concerned when i switch back to gas will my performance be affected?
I notice you said "use to be " so now as u not there any more how do you rate the kit supplied by said company.
Also is there any alternative Reliable installers who install cng with rated tanks etc.
What major faults/complaints did you guys have with the cng system installed in the vehicle.

User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » June 19th, 2011, 7:29 pm

Yes, Zee, post some pics of the trunk.

Regarding filling up, it is better that you fill up in the night, that way your tank will hold more.

There is a noticeable loss of power with CNG, but it is not that bad, and the savings is more than worth it for me. That being said, i have been told that the new system they testing works just as good as gas, performance wise .

I am not sure how true that 400 km is. I get 100 miles on a 16 dollar fill up.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 19th, 2011, 8:14 pm

hong kong phooey wrote:Red Dawg I have read these comments and i dont understand what is done with your air intake.
I am just concerned when i switch back to gas will my performance be affected?
I notice you said "use to be " so now as u not there any more how do you rate the kit supplied by said company.
Also is there any alternative Reliable installers who install cng with rated tanks etc.
What major faults/complaints did you guys have with the cng system installed in the vehicle.


The kit installed by ACL has an air regulator, basically it is a throttle butterfly that is fitted on the air intake to reduce the amount of air going into the engine when it is running on CNG. When the vehicle is on Gasoline this valve will be fully open to allow more air in.

User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » June 22nd, 2011, 1:36 am

Nice. That is a 70 Litre tank? I met a guy with a a33 Cefiro the other day and he had in a 70L tank, and he said he was going to add a 30, on top of the 70.

They have fibre glass tanks now, but i have never met anyone with it.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 22nd, 2011, 1:28 pm

TrinbagoMan wrote:Nice. That is a 70 Litre tank? I met a guy with a a33 Cefiro the other day and he had in a 70L tank, and he said he was going to add a 30, on top of the 70.

They have fibre glass tanks now, but i have never met anyone with it.


Actually, there are no fibreglass tanks. There Aluminium tanks that are wrapped in fibreglass as a reinforcement.
Please remember that CNG fills to 3000 psi and the tanks must pass a burst pressure test of 4500 psi.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 22nd, 2011, 1:48 pm

Here is a diagram of the system as it would be installed on they average fuel injected vehicle with the tank installed in the trunk and the regulator and mixer assembly in the engine compartment.

Image
Last edited by Red Dawg on June 22nd, 2011, 2:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 22nd, 2011, 1:50 pm

Here is basically system, but with a lambda sensor fitted into the exhaust that adds an additional control to the fuel mixture when running on CNG.

Image
Last edited by Red Dawg on June 22nd, 2011, 2:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 22nd, 2011, 1:53 pm

This is what I am waiting to see if they will bring.
A fuel injected CNG system that injects high pressure CNG directly into the intake manifold.
The system runs on its own ECU and is programable on a rolling road dyno.
It is reported that there is no power loss on this system.

Image

User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » June 22nd, 2011, 3:15 pm

Good info Red Dawg, they have that system presently at ACL, but they ironing some kinks with it before they offer it for installation.

User avatar
shaneelal
Riding on 16's
Posts: 1165
Joined: February 10th, 2007, 10:25 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby shaneelal » June 22nd, 2011, 6:49 pm

Zee wrote:@Trinbagoman, it is a 70L tank. That new system sounds good, I hope they get it to work soon...


The new installation should be something like this (very good info) -


User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » June 22nd, 2011, 10:41 pm

@ Zee Tell us how much mileage you getting with your setup, as i doh make anywhere close to 400 km.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 26th, 2011, 9:36 am

The brown wire is a signal wire for the CNG system that lets the system know that the engine is running.
If the engine stops running, the system will shut down the flow of gas so that there will not be a build up.
This wire is usually connected to a tachometer signal or to the negative side of an ignition coil. In some older installations it is simply wrapped around or clipped onto a plug wire.

This wire has no voltage output on it and strictly a sensor. it is possible that if the wire is pinched or grounded somewhere in the loom that it will act as a kill switch.
Since this wire is not connected to the crank sensor and since this wire does not have any voltage output, I would have to say that your mechanic is guessing at the cause of the failure.

However, if the failure can be definitely traced back to some fault in the installation, then ACL is liable and should be made to cover the cost of the repair.

triniringo
3NE 2NR for life
Posts: 224
Joined: October 18th, 2009, 3:25 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby triniringo » June 26th, 2011, 1:18 pm

Hey red dawg....thanks for all the info on cng.
Do u agree that there is a loss in power and if so by how much.I have been monitoring the feedback
for quite a while and I am 50/50 if i should go ahead and convert now.Also the price quoted to me was $8260.00 however this price will go up to $9000.00 very soon.
And how often does this system require maintainance

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » June 27th, 2011, 2:16 pm

There is some power loss, simply because our cars are optimised for gasoline, if you have driven that was specifically built to run on CNG then you would be surprised how well it runs.
If the CNG refueling network was better, I would actually consider building an all CNG car.

While I have nothing against CNG, I must ask why you are considering converting. Many people say that they are converting to save money but you spending $9000 up front to save money.
If you do alot of driving, such as a taxi driver or a sales person on the road, the the conversion makes sense because you will see a return on the investment.

So many people complain about the price of gasoline in T&T, yet we have the cheapest gasoline in the caribbean. I currently work in St. Kitts & Nevis where the gasoline costs EC$15.00 per gallon, that is TT$9.32 per liter. My old Beemer costs TT$160.00 to fill, here it will cost EC$240 which is TT$565.00.

I digress
If you want to get the most power from the CNG, consider an ignition upgrade, like and MSD, CNG has a higher octane rating than gasoline which means that it is harder to ignite, it is also slower burning than gasoline which is why the put an ignition advance unit with the CNG Kit.

The bottom line is that the better condition that your engine is in, the better it will run on CNG. While cars with weak ignitions and low compression may not show much problems on gasoline they will quickly become apparent on CNG.

As part of the pre-installation check, they should do a compression test to verify the condition of the engine. When I was installing, we actually used to turn away customers whose cars failed the check.

User avatar
bushwakka
punchin NOS
Posts: 4353
Joined: August 24th, 2007, 1:02 pm
Location: GPS unavailable

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby bushwakka » July 1st, 2011, 11:11 am

well explained red dawg

User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » July 9th, 2011, 8:59 am

That economy sounds more realistic, but if your injectors, throttle body, plugs need cleaning or changing, i suspect that your economy will improve.

My car has a four cylinder, 2000 cc engine, and i get about 155 km per fillup (70 l tank), if i do a lot of city/traffic driving. If i do more highway runs, i get up to 208 kms per fill up sometimes. This is with ac on.

I fill up once every two/three days.

I have an msd kit which i am going to install next week, so i will let you all know how that works out.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » July 9th, 2011, 11:13 am

Just a note,
The Fuel Injectors have nothing to do with the Operation of the CNG system.
They only operate on Gasoline and are switched off when the car is running on CNG.
Cleaning the Injectors will not improve the CNG mileage.

trinilife
Street 2NR
Posts: 60
Joined: February 22nd, 2006, 10:36 am
Location: San Juan

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby trinilife » August 26th, 2011, 11:30 pm

cng works well on an sr20 engine,but will it work on a turbo charged sr ,question for red dog.

User avatar
CD4Accord
Riding on 18's
Posts: 1609
Joined: December 15th, 2009, 12:20 am

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby CD4Accord » August 27th, 2011, 2:43 am

Let me throw an alternative into the mix....
When we were young we used to have a PAU 280c...
My dad and a few friends actually bought propane conversion kits for the vehicles..
Had a similar fuel pump switch like the CNG cars and it would feed propane from a 100lb tank in the trunk...
I can't give you specifics but I know that the propane gave just slightly less KM than the gas in the gas tank and that switching was no serious drama.. The switch also functioned as kill/security switch which saved the vehicle on more than one occasion..

Overall, it was excellent until the gov't banned ramco from selling propane for automotive use.. It was one of the cleanest burning fuels around and as a result there was NO carbon buildup or soot in the engine, and those 280c's were known to have serious problems with blow-by, buildup etc..

Switching the tank also wasn't a big deal because the ramco deliver fellas would have done it for you, or you could have just driven down there...
When we sold the 280 it still had the mounts for the tank and all the equipment in place.. Shame the buyer probably converted it into a N/A diesel engine...

Honestly, I would rather just run propane over CNG any day...

I will get some more details from mih buckman about the cost of the conversion back in 91 or so

User avatar
bushwakka
punchin NOS
Posts: 4353
Joined: August 24th, 2007, 1:02 pm
Location: GPS unavailable

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby bushwakka » August 28th, 2011, 11:01 am

how long does it take to fill the 70 L tank? i heard it takes a lot longer than pumpin gasoline?

i hate to hafta go in a gas station. I go once a week now ......anyway

can someone do a rough calculation for the amt of kilometers u wud hafta drive on CNG b4 u cud break even on ur initial $9000 investment.....i dunno how much u pay for filling the 70L tank is why im asking and also fuel economy except what has been suggested by some users here

User avatar
TrinbagoMan
3NE2NR is my LIFE
Posts: 737
Joined: June 12th, 2009, 4:47 pm

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TrinbagoMan » August 28th, 2011, 12:45 pm

takes approx 3 mins to fill a 70 L tank. It used to take much longer in the early days of cng apparently, but now they have higher psi pumps.

User avatar
bushwakka
punchin NOS
Posts: 4353
Joined: August 24th, 2007, 1:02 pm
Location: GPS unavailable

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby bushwakka » September 4th, 2011, 10:05 am

^^yea, that was helpful....i dont tink it wud make sense for me, i hav a 08 impreza 1.5R, the additional weight of that tank alone wud make me crawl even more

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re:

Postby Red Dawg » September 5th, 2011, 8:56 am

skylineGTR55036018 wrote:cng takes a toll on your engine seals also...


ABSOLUTELY NOT TRUE

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » September 5th, 2011, 9:00 am

bushwakka wrote:^^yea, that was helpful....i dont tink it wud make sense for me, i hav a 08 impreza 1.5R, the additional weight of that tank alone wud make me crawl even more


I would not recommend CNG on an engine lower than 2.0 liter.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » September 5th, 2011, 9:12 am

trinilife wrote:cng works well on an sr20 engine,but will it work on a turbo charged sr ,question for red dog.


There are CNG kits for turbo charged engines and we did one installation when I was there, however that car had so many problems that were not related to the CNG that ACL decided not to bring any more turbo kits.

The only difference between the turbo CNG kit and the Naturally aspirated CNG kits is that the regulator for the turbo charged kit is designed to sense boost pressure and compensate to suit.
Exactly like a rising rate regulator.

User avatar
wagonrunner
TriniTuner 24-7
Posts: 13491
Joined: May 18th, 2004, 9:38 am
Location: Distancing myself from those who want to raid the barn but eh want to plant the corn.
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby wagonrunner » September 5th, 2011, 9:25 am

Red Dawg wrote:
bushwakka wrote:^^yea, that was helpful....i dont tink it wud make sense for me, i hav a 08 impreza 1.5R, the additional weight of that tank alone wud make me crawl even more


I would not recommend CNG on an engine lower than 2.0 liter.

why?
had it in at least 4 1.5's.
3 of which were carb'd. no disadvantageous really.

new acquaintance also has it in his 1.5 Carb for the last 2 years, and happy with it.

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » September 5th, 2011, 10:13 am

We all agree that there is some power loss when running on CNG simply because the engines in our cars are optimised to run on gasoline.
In my experience installing CNG, the power loss on engines below 1.8 or 2.0 liter was extremely noticeable.
That does not mean that we did not convert them, we did many conversions to smaller engines.
But how much gasoline does a properly tuned and maintained 1.5 or 1.6 liter engine consume. Is it so high that you need to convert to CNG.

User avatar
wagonrunner
TriniTuner 24-7
Posts: 13491
Joined: May 18th, 2004, 9:38 am
Location: Distancing myself from those who want to raid the barn but eh want to plant the corn.
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby wagonrunner » September 5th, 2011, 11:00 am

Red Dawg wrote:We all agree that there is some power loss when running on CNG simply because the engines in our cars are optimised to run on gasoline.
In my experience installing CNG, the power loss on engines below 1.8 or 2.0 liter was extremely noticeable.
That does not mean that we did not convert them, we did many conversions to smaller engines.
But how much gasoline does a properly tuned and maintained 1.5 or 1.6 liter engine consume. Is it so high that you need to convert to CNG.

abusing early RB's from la romain to tetron and back on $14 beat the $40-50 with the non CNG car. and that was three times a week.
once the cars making the mileage, the savings add up. and it is only now we have cars that are parked the majority of the day. :|

User avatar
Red Dawg
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 605
Joined: April 22nd, 2003, 5:26 pm
Location: On the inside at Zorce
Contact:

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby Red Dawg » September 5th, 2011, 11:30 am

If you driving from La Romain to Tetron and back on a regular basis, then the CNG makes much sense.
Glad to hear its working well for you.

TESTED performance
Chronic TriniTuner
Posts: 550
Joined: May 26th, 2006, 8:21 am

Re: Trinituner People: My CNG Experience

Postby TESTED performance » September 11th, 2013, 6:22 am

Why did this thread die?
Have there been any recent advancements in this technology?
My experience was consistent with what was explain so far except for no one mentioning one problem I had where as long as the pressure indicator was below half for the CNG the car had idle problems sometimes even cutting off.
Also I wish someone could advise as to if there are more seamless installation solutions for the CNG tank.
For example I want to install it in a station wagon but the whole reason for getting the wagon was to have the additional storage space when the rear seats are folded down. A permanently fixed CNG tank behind the rear seats negates the usefulness of the wagon in that configuration.
I would think by now someone should have found a way to re-purpose the space where the OEM fuel tank is positioned, and fit a smaller fuel cell like the ones used in race car applications along with a CNG tank. Also I am seeing documentation online that suggests that light weight FRP composite tanks are available (at higher costs). If the trunk space issue could be resolved as well as the tremendous additional weight burden of the the standard metal tanks, I would be willing to live with the power loss since that power is always available at the push of a button. I think many other people would agree with me on this thought process.

Advertisement

Return to “AUTOMOTIVE TECH”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 9 guests