CNG Tacoma?? (compressed natural gas)

I have been hearing a lot about CNG lately and am seriously considering converting my truck, my buddy has a Civic he did and its pretty damn sweet. only 2$ a gallon and the same milage. I was wondering if anyone has a CNG Taca or any experience with these kits??

 

what happens when you are out of fuel and there are no gas stations around with your fuel?

 

This is the big problem with all the alt. fuels.
You used to be able to get a compressor to set up at home to use your home natural gas so that would help but there are few Nat. gas pumps out in the world.

 

yeah I don't think ive ever seen one around here. Cool idea for just a daily commuter car though.

 

all UPS and for me PG&E (Pacific gas and electric) stations have CNG for sale. my Neighbor drove cross county no problem, and if I do it I'm getting a kit where you have a switch on the dash and you can switch from normal gas to CNG anytime, even while rolling wich seems amazing

 

cool. I always thought that once you switch you can't burn normal gas anymore.

 

Are there any side effects of doing that ie. power loss, torque loss?

 

i was in south america not too long ago went to lima peru and all the cars run off natural gas (they also have some hiluxes there and i would love to import one here haha) ive always had the questions about why in the states we dont have natural gas as popular as most other countries

but ya one of the taxis told me that the car runs more smoother and has more power he had some technical explenation but meh i forgot

they put big tanks in the back of most the cars and under alot of the trucks like where the tacoma has spare tire

anyways sorry i dont answer your question directly but my couple cents of info

 

Yep I have seen this to! and if gas ever sky rocket's again or we have a shortage I'll still be driving around when everyone else is struggling because there is no Natural gas shortage at all!! we have more then we know what to do with! and its all from american soil!! and that's important to me to!

 

I can't believe this isn't more popular in vehicles given our abundance of natural gas. We have to find a way to fuel effectively at home. Roughly 56% of homes use natural gas.

 

hey in Hong Kong all the taxi's and the buses run on it. It was amazing how quiet and clean they are. The taxi's are a Toyota model, not sure which one, but for a small, or smaller 4 door they have ton's more back seat room than the old crown vic's used here and same amount of truck space.

 

http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/showthread.php?t=154599

 

So far there is only one pump that is certified for home use, it's called a phill station, and they cost around 5k.

 

I work for Hyster the forklift manufacturer and have been around and worked on these units. The problem is there is major loss in horsepower between gas and CNG it's around 50%, the fill times are excessive that home fill unit if I am not mistaken used to take 8 hours to refill like the equivalent to only 3-4 gallons of gas (think about it your home CNG only works off what 3-4 #). They can be set up for what is referred to as dual fuel, basically you add a fuel mixer over your throttle body and injects the gas this way, not sure how well this will work with mulit point fuel injections because the upper intakes on these vehicles are only designed to flow air not liquids or gas. Currently the CNG or LP vehicles do not fit with the American lifestyle and infrastructure. If it were do able and cost effective we would already have it as an option.

 

Interesting information.

I'd like to find out more, but everything I have read is that there is no power loss and it does take 8 hours at home but that is a full tank. So basically you could plug it in overnight one weekend night and be good for the week.

I have also read that alot of the fleet companies who are running this in their vehicles are now offering to the public. I hope this takes off.

Cheap, clean & domestic energy.

 

well I don't know about the power loss, but if you saw the double decker buses zooming around Hong Kong and Kowloon, and on Hong Kong island proper there are lots of steep hills and small mountains, and they don't have any trouble zooming around.

 

recent article on truck trend. A CNG option from ford for Superduty. It can run off of CNG or Gas. Article states 15% loss in power and economy. It is a 10k option..Better off getting diesel for the money. Look into Clean Energy Fuels Corp. They have plans in place to put CNG/LNG fueling stations every 250 miles along I-95, I-10, I-40, I-5 and around chicago. So it is coming but not soon. Nat. Gas is projected to be the principal fuel for motor vehicles by 2028. FWIW

http://www.trucktrend.com/roadtests...d_f250_xlt_westport_cng_first_test/index.html

 

I work for a manufacture that sells CNG lift trucks, it's 50% power loss compared to gas, 25% power loss over diesel. They get 1/2 the fuel economy, 1/2. So even at approximately half the cost when converted to cost per gallon it's around 1.80 per gallon and the huge cost for our CNG option I just don't see the benefit, don't trust some of the sources that are pushing CNG they have a horse in the race.

Also my local utility company that sells CNG usedto have there over the road and service trucks running on it, this summer they switched them all back to gas!!

 

If that's the case, sounds like you need to look for a new job.

 

Why is that ?