Toyota Prius 2nd Gen. - converted to LPG hybrid

Since November 2013, I have driven my prius for further 10,000km's.

I can now state that since I installed LPG, this car burns oil... in the past 9,000km's I believe I had to add oil in excess of 4liters, in the intervals of 1,000km's I had to top up oil.

Since the warranty on the lpg kit expires soon, I had no choice but to write the statement of oil consumption and send to the installer. I asked lpg installer to take a look at the car.

Yesterday I had 2nd standard lpg service (EUR30: filters etc), the system started to make noises, doesn't work.

I sent looong email to the installer.

 

i read that you are not on lpg. yes, my numbers showing its not payable driving on lpg. I have brand new 12v battery, regular servicing, nice set of hankook tyres with great rating... but it's just causing troubles:

- obvious one is an oil consumption
- the overall lpg consumption is high, and the tank is relatively small, this doesn't look well
- Ireland has really poor lpg infrastructure, I need to drive 10km's to the nearest lpg station
- Servicing is not easy to perform as DIY, the installer has hidden filters under the area of wiper blades section - it takes 15-20 min to access the area plus another 20+ minutes to perform the service, plus cost of parts, cost of labor.
- time spent for this joke is just not payable driving on lpg

sorry, if one had more time to diy it, more understanding for poor explanations as to why car burns oil.

I had driven this car since 2010, when I bought it it had aboit 100k km's. I drove it withput issues until I installed lpg. so: with previous 85k km's (total of my own kilometers driven in this car at the time of installation it had circa 186k on the odometer (100k of the old owner and 85k of my own) all that without a notion of oil burn, at circa 186k when I installed lpg the troubles started.

now i'm at 210k km's - car burns oil. no good. circa 23,5k worth of kilometers driven and the car consumes too much of an oil.

I'm not happy lpg user. defo not happy.

 

Numbers:

If we round to 24,000km's the costs of petrol to drive this distance would be (let's keep it simple):

if I was to use petrol alone in the past 11 months, per tank I could drive easily 700km's ( I know I can ever drive 800 km per 40liters tank), but to illustrate the numbers let's use this value.
7000km uses 400liters of petrol, 21000km's uses 1200 liters of petrol @1,52 this would give us a cost of EUR1824.

to compare, my historical lpg consumption is as follows:

I drove 22,233 km's (combined lpg with petrol), I spent EUR1,313 for lpg and EUR383 for petrol, in total EUR1696.00

After 11 months my fuel consumption savings were worth of EUR128

During these long 11 months I have refilled lpg at least 50 times (I keep in my locker each single receipt from the very same supplier). It usually takes me 1 hour to make a trip to refuel it. This in total costs me 50 hours of my time for refueling of lpg.

Add the servicing times (1x first free checkup (not a service really) 2x filters serviced in the past 11 months), maybe 2 hours for each. so another 4-5 hours plus driving time so let's say 10hours for that and earlier 50 so around 60 hours wasted so far. that's 10 days work of work. For me it could be nice check/cheque for 10 days of work .

LPG Installation time took 2-3 days. EUR1,000 later with the saving of EUR128

it just doesn't add up.

 

Curious about the oil consumption. I wonder if it's because the pistons had got overly hot? A number of my ex-colleagues would run lpg and some cars were absolutely fine on it and others just didn't like it at all. The Vauxhalls were ok, but the Fords would throw an engine warning lamp code. I remember some of the drivers complaining of increased oil consumption, but can't remember which manufacturer.

 

And what is the expirience of your friend who had lpg before u did. What are the numbers for him?

I can see conection for lpg burning oil. Where did u buy your car. Odometer manipulated?

 

I did a little quick research on my own, a quality LPG system and professional install would cost me around €2,000, bellow that price there are just to many unhappy users and I'm talking about normal cars.

LPG costs roughly 50% less than petrol, but total savings maxes out at around 30%, because of higher consumption, valve lube, servicing. Prius just uses too little gas or the price of petrol is just not high enough to be worth it.

 

I saw a Gen 2 Prius on the 91 Freeway in Orange County, California, with a CNG sticker the other day. It did not have White HOV Stickers so I assumed it was a joke, but then it got me wondering if having that CNG sticker is a requirement for a CNG conversion car. Are people actually starting to convert their Prius's to CNG? Or is this still a handful of people venturing into these projects?

 

Darknula, not a chance that odo was manipulated.

My friend who owns another toyota also installed lpg at the same garage earlier, that is correct, he also complains about oil consumption. I do not have detailes as to how much and how often.

My prius was purchased from family in Dublin late 2010 - private purchase, previous owner did maintain Toyota servicing and I also kept the same in the same dealership in Dublin

I was writing previous post under own kilometers driven. I did not mention previous owners mileage (just added this info).

I removed spark plugs yesterday. they were burnt out. Grumpy is correct. Temperature plays its role here.

 

Gasper

the installation was carried out in authorized centre. I have valve lube installed.

 

Photos of spark plugs?

Would it be helpful to install spark plugs that run a cooler heat range? The correct Denso plug is SK16R11 but it appears that it is possible to order plugs that run up to 34. Maybe the 20 or 22 would be better if offered in the size that will fit Prius. See the sixth FAQ below.
Frequently Asked Questions: DENSO Iridium

 

Patrick, It's 2am here.

I will go to the car and take the old spark plugs.

 

any recourse? I still have 1 month of warranty on this lpg system left.. i doubt the installer would accept any liability.

 

Do you know which cylinders the first two plugs on the left came from? I am wondering why they have reddish deposits vs the last two plugs whose insulators are white.

Does the LPG warranty cover damage to the gasoline engine itself?

Do you have instrumentation that allows you to monitor engine cylinder head coolant temperature as you are driving the car? If so, what is the operating temp of the engine?

 

I don't know which cylinders they coming from.

The warranty... I don't know as yet. perhaps I should consult my solicitor and ask if consumer law, sales of goods act, "fit for purpose"clause or another clause might give me override of the warranty.

At present I don't have such device (presumably we are talking about scangauge or similar? - I almost purchased elm, but finally I cancelled order. I purchased another cable to read codes, but this is still in the box as I sold my xp laptop and win8.1 doesn't run diagnostic s/w too easily) - in short: no

 

02:44am , I need to get some sleep

 

OK. If you want to use Mini VCI with Windows 8.1, that might be painful and a separate Windows XP license appears to be required. Probably easier to buy a used Windows XP laptop.

Microsoft Community - Microsoft Windows

 

Typo here, I wanted to say I CANNOT see a connection, so if anybody can explain it?

 

Car runs hotter on lpg. The pistons get hotter than they should expanding a little more than the really should. That extra expansion causes wear. When they cool down they're ever so slightly bigger than they should be and thus allow more oil to blow past, causing increased oil consumption.

Do a search for lpg and engines running hot. There are lots of results. It doesn't happen to all engines. I'm no expert on it but I do recall other taxi drivers complaining of it.

 

is it worthwhile to argue with the installer of lpg to insist that this caused premature engine wear?

 

Always worth a try. Whether you'll get anywhere is another matter. Were there any warnings in the brochure? Did it insist on different plugs or changing them more frequently? What sort of installer was it? Is it a professional place or just one bloke operating out of a back street garage?

You also have a car with massive miles and some Prii are known to burn oil when they get older. Maybe it's just a coincidence? If you had a newish car with 14,000 on the clock you might have a potential case. With 190,000 you'll struggle.

Saying all of this. I'm just an ex-taxi driver. I know nothing. If you're really concerned, seek professional advice, though whether you're throwing good money after bad is another matter.