You could use a schraeder valve tool to remove the valve temporarily while you have the pressure gauge connected. Some such tools look a bit like a radiator key but with a forked end.

dave3d wrote:

There is a gap in the market now disposing of EV batteries in an environmentally friendly way, if you are wanting to diversify Lpgc.

I've wondered if I should diversify into EV's in some way. As an 8 year old kid I knew I wouldn't be able to drive a car until I was older but I was always using my dad's tools to build 'trolleys' and imagined making an electric soap box / trolley / buggy I'd be able to drive on the pavement powered by car batteries. I think I'd find it interesting to get into the electric conversion of old cars scene but the price of EV drive trains and batteries from scrap cars is very high and I expect some of the second hand batteries will already be a bit worn out. Why is it always old classic cars that get converted to EV's anyway, e.g. why is it always something like a 1970's Triumph Stag and not a 2010 Mondeo, is this to avoid type testing or something?

I wonder if a 7.2kw generator running off LPG in the back of an EV would be viable, if so some owners might be interested in an emergency charging system to avoid getting stranded and help ease range anxiety... buy a frame model and see which EV's it could be made to fit in. Before EV's I wondered about fitting a little genny to a disability buggy ;-) My dad's mate had a stroke, got a disability buggy and used to come the 5 miles from his home all uphill to visit, always needed a charge to get home. If he'd had a genny onboard he could have gone any distance he liked without running out of charge, would only have to be a 300watt job ;-)

A few years ago I unwisely got involved in arguing about EVs on PistonHeads forum, I should have known better lol! I first looked at EV threads out of interest but when I read how users were all saying how convenient and inexpensive they were to run I couldn't help sticking my oar in. I said charging couldn't stay free, range is too limited unless you only use for local shopping trips and charge at home, charging time is too long and inconvenient, length of charging time implies ques at chargers as EVs become more popular, they're not as environmentally friendly as manufacturers would have us believe, etc, and I said it would be cheaper to run a little car on LPG than an EV. I haven't posted on PistonHeads forum for a few years now but it seems I'm still remembered and strongly disliked by EVers for my earlier comments / arguments - some of my customers have mentioned me on unrelated threads, still EVers remember me and say 'ahh that nutter on the EV threads etc etc' (even if most of what I said and predicted has turned out to be true).

The other day I did have another read on PistonHeads and found this thread
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=247&t=1921254
The opening post and a video a bit further down the thread are potential situations I would have concerns about suffering if I switched to an EV.
But I haven't posted lol...

There's a guy on PistonHeads called MaxTorque who claims to be involved in EV development, which I don't doubt, he also claims to have been involved with development of the Koltec factory fitted LPG conversions at one time, I don't doubt that either. But I do doubt the depth and range of his involvement because he claims to be involved in everything from battery development, through motors and control development to chassis development. Around 10 years ago I remember a bloke called Max and his wife visiting me to have his Koltec system fixed on his Astra, that Max also told me he was a key developer of the Koltec system... I remember this because I wondered why, if he had developed it, did he seem to know bugger all about it and not know how to fix it himself. A few years ago I asked MaxTorque around 4 times if he was the same Max who brought his Koltec system to me for repair, he never did answer but every time I asked seemed to wait a couple of days until discussion/argument had moved on before his next post. I see all sorts of ironies in some of his posts, including how a couple of years ago he was saying fast chargers would be easy to set up all over the place including on most forecourts... while at work his firm developing EV's relied on diesel generators to charge EVs.

Is it supposed to have 50/50 mix of water and antifreze? Water has a higher specific heat capacity than antifreze, so a cooling system with a greater water:antifreze ratio has better cooling capacity than one with a higher ratio of antifreze.

Another thing I'd check is mixture but I expect you have ;-).

Again none of this should affect temp because the thermostat controls temp... but if the engine is going to get hot due to pushing the cooling system with the stat open it's more likely to get hot with more antifreze in the mix and leaner mixture.

That looks fantastic, a credit to you, congratulations Dave!

What's the plan for it now, drive it / show it / etc ?

If that's an after and before pick she looks a lot better before lol.

dave3d wrote:

Holland seems to be the place where old hybrids go to die. I looked at Volvo bits for mine just as a matter of interest and there were loads of Dutch breakers.

That's interesting, mind you the thought occurs that if it were easy to sell an EV converted classic for £245k it would be worth buying a brand new EV, perhaps even a Tesla, to remove it's drivetrain to fit in the classic!

I also don't see the market for a £245k EV converted classic rangerover but would expect the firm making them to know their market... I expect the 50 classic rangerovers will end up being shipped all over the world?

Someone clear this up for me - Is it usually classic cars that are converted to EVs because converting an older car avoids having to type test the results? Or why not an EV L322 etc?

Prompted me to look at parts (batteries, drive units, etc) from breaking EVs on Ebay... Seems sellers expect top prices for parts and it would be difficult to buy a complete smashed up EV. These firms that convert classic cars to EV must have some sort of arrangement with insurance companies to get first shot at buying a smashed up EV? I'd be up for doing EV conversions if parts were available at reasonable cost, there seems to be a market for it.

Quoted from the link

Lunaz announced it was to produce classic electric Range Rovers - with prices starting at £245,000.
The company, based in Silverstone, Northamptonshire, is creating an initial run of 50 of the luxury SUVs built in the ‘classic era’ between 1970 and 1994.

£245000 lol.. but they expect 50 buyers at least and I'd bet they get them, crazy though.

I put a lot of work off on my own cars due to working on customers cars but there are limits to what I'd put off hehe! Would definitely sort this kind of problem pronto... and know not to drive it in the meantime.

Just a quick post..

I LPG converted an early L322 with BMW 4.4 for a guy from the other side of Barnsley from me (over 10 miles away) around 8 years ago, the same owner phoned me a couple of days ago to say it had started losing a lot of water and could I have a look at it please, asked me to give him a call when I had a bit of time. So today I phoned him and he drove over 10 miles to see me, in the last couple of days he's also been using it on the motorway..

As soon as he pulled up I saw loads of steam coming from under the bonnet. Pulled the bonnet and saw the steam was coming from the back of the engine. Removed the engine cover and removed the middle/heater air filter panel on the bulkhead for visibility and access (he's an ex mechanic who now works for a firm that supplies HGV bits but he'd never had the engine cover off and didn't know the middle panel could be removed).

I found a coolant T (for the LPG reducer) had snapped, there was hardly any coolant left in the engine at all. After leaving the engine to cool for some time and after I'd fitted a new T and put the middle panel and engine cover back on I put some antifreeze and water in it and it ran absolutely fine.

He said he has been topping the water up at home and at work but I'm very surprised the engine was still running and wasn't cooked, especially as he'd been on the motorway with it etc, it must have quickly pumped all it's coolant out due to the severity of the leak.

Even a sports car won't go as fast if when it hits a bump it bounces across the road...

Reminds me of boy racers who lower their cars then have to drive slower than ever over speed bumps otherwise they'll lose their bumper / exhaust lol. Similar story for them with firmer shocks, they might do marginally better on a smooth race-track with firmer shocks but unless they're Colin McCrae re-incarnate they'll probably go slower on potholed roads. Had a boy racer go past me on the motorway the other day, exhaust drone must have been annoying, it also showed off the fact he only had a 4 pot engine under the bonnet.

Some or all super unleaded will still be neat or E5 though, no worries if running on LPG just use the more expensive E5 for the bit of petrol we use?

I'm sorry for going off topic at the start but I continued to post because Mace said he'd found a problem with his CKP signal in the same way I had on a different model vehicle. I didn't want to take the topic completely off track but as an aside I thought at least you, Mace and I were interested in this.

I see what you mean.. If the object is to look for the 6v pulse which is a position reference point (for say TDC), the 4v pulses from other teeth (even though intended and necessary signals) could be considered noise - and you're saying it is the convention to consider the 4v signals noise even though they're intended and necessary? Fair enough. But you'll understand other people thinking that in the wider context the 4v pulses from the other teeth are not just base/background noise because they are intended and necessary, the engine wouldn't run properly without them?

Are the pulses from your reluctance sensors always 4v for teeth that are close together and 6v for the gap or do these voltages change with engine RPM (frequency)?

Are we correct in thinking that the 6v pulse is bigger than the other 4v pulses because of the wider gap between teeth, or is something else making the pulse from the bigger gap higher voltage than other pulses that are closer together (I would think it's due to the wider gap)?

Are you implying that the ECU looks for the higher voltage pulse to detect the (say TDC) engine position or would you say the ECU is looking for the missing tooth/pulse to detect TDC (I would think it's looking for the missing pulse)?

If the ECU detects the (say TDC) position by the missing pulse (and especially if voltages of pulses change with RPM) I still don't understand why you reckon the 4v teeth signals should be considered noise that might detract from the ECU's ability to properly detect the (say TDC) engine position?

Apologies to Mace again for keeping this up. Dave I'm not wanting to argue, I want to understand.

davew wrote:

I see you are in one of your overly-pedantic moods (again) Lpgc !

"Ah, I see where you misunderstood: In this particular context of course the 'base noise' is (using your choice of voltage) the 4V signal and the Timing reference signal is the 6V spike (triggering a positive spike on the trailing edge before the gap and a negative on the leading edge of the next tooth in the PICO/Jag scope illustration I posted). "

Happier now Lpgc ? I also note I wrote 'ECM' instead of 'ETM'..... although at least I tried to stay on the Reluctance/P38 topic !!
Again the main point is a Basic Coil, as we use for CKP, is really not ideal

Incidentally within RF/AC descriptions where there is a constant background signal it is totally valid/conventional to describe this as "base noise" and any 'event' occurring during that is the signal (of interest). Pedants may not agree with this entirely of course....

Not being over pedantic Dave, just interested what those 4v spikes were. If they're noise fair enough but Gilbert's said the reluctor ring has multiple teeth besides the gap for TDC, could those 4v spikes be the other teeth? And if they are they're not background noise....

davew wrote:

Ah, I see where you misunderstood: In this particular context of course the 'base noise' is (using your choice of voltage) the 4V signal and the Timing reference signal is the 6V spike (triggering a positive on the leading edge and a negative on the trailing edge of the tooth in the PICO/Jag scope illustration I posted).

The main point again though is that we are just dealing with a few volts (AC) here between 'states' (ie. between tooth/no tooth/ or even double tooth..) and this can be very easily disrupted, particularly by the tooth-sensor 'air gap'; It makes more sense if/when you see a faulty P38 CKP signal in practice... I have (had ?) a photo of this -somewhere- posted up years ago on RRsnet, via a storage scope IIRC (along with the ECM illustration,) but I am not going to try to search for it on there thanks to their almost-useless 'search facility' !

If you do scope it mace take a photo ....

Not sure if your sensors work on starter motor teeth or on separate (for purpose) position sensing teeth? As I looked at it each 4v spike is signal from an individual tooth and I might assume the higher 6v spike after a position sensing gap is due to something related to magnetic flux causing a higher voltage pulse after a long period of no pulse but I'm no expert in the way these sensors work. Surely though the 4v spikes are not noise?

Like Mace I don't see much noise on your scope trace though Davew?

davew wrote:

The Crank Sensor is just a basic coil, and there is precious little attempt to clean up the output

I was talking another make/model vehicle

The signal still looks very square even with the scope set on a faster time base but I didn't take any pics on faster time bases.

The engine symptoms (sudden multiple cylinder misfires) and rev counter reading fluctuation (also rpm reading in OBD live data) occurred simultaneously with the double width pulse, no double width pulse no symptoms, no symptoms no double width pulse. Tried with several different crank sensors fitted the results always the same. The fault and symptoms mostly occurred with pinj>9ms (> around 0.8bar map) and rpm > around 2K but it also sometimes displayed symptoms of poor starting.

mace wrote:

Interestingly enough, I hooked my scope up to my crank sensor a week or two ago, trying to find a reason for slightly lumpy running. Noticed that most of the signal spikes were the same amplitude, but three or four of them were higher. Took the cover off and very subtly tweaked a couple of teeth which weren't bang on parallel, and it made a big difference to the running. Bizarre, but hey.

My best guess is that the ECU looks for a voltage increase above a threshold, and the faster ramp time on the big pulses was causing it to fire ever so slightly early.

I should have mentioned that I tried a couple of replacement crank sensors before reaching the conclusion.
The output from these crank sensors always give pulses of the same amplitude and the connecting wire to the ECU isn't a shielded wire, I expect the crank sensor on this vehicle contains electronics that clean up / filter the signal and always output the same amplitude pulse. There are 30 grooves on the flex plate for the crank sensor to pick up on (the crank sensor doesn't use ring gear teeth) set in 3 groups of 10, each group separated by a long uncut section. I expect that if the crank sensor misses a groove (due to seeing a double width pulse) it will count 9 pulses (instead of 10) in quick succession and then interpret the longer pause (due to the uncut section) before seeing a 10th pulse as a sudden drop in engine rpm, the rev counter and OBD readings certainly seemed to agree with this. Looking through the crank sensor hole I rotated the engine looking for any scars / debris / dirt, I did find some seemingly magnetic particles stuck to the flex plate and removed them, don't know if these came from a failed previous crank sensor or from the starter motor, same problem remained after I'd cleaned the flex plate best I could anyway. I got someone to crank the engine while I watched the flex plate, there was a little bit of run-out as it turned but I didn't think it excessive or enough to cause the problems. I considered trying to use a de-gauzing wand on the flex plate but working through the small hole the crank sensor uses I doubt I could have got in with a de-gauzing wand even if I could find one (probably last saw one my dad owned for tape recorder heads around 40 years ago lol) and if I'd have got it wrong with the de-gauzing wand could have created even more problems. Using my scope (and it's limited capabilities including it's low resolution small screen) I could only accurately see around 180 degrees of engine rotation at around 2000rpm but I ran the same tests many times and the double width pulse and engine symptoms only ever occurred simultaneously.

While I've been typing this the owner has txted me to say he's been to the specialist vehicle dismantler who has spent 6 hours changing crank and cam sensor looms and 'running various other diagnostics'. I asked if he'd used a scope to check the crank sensor pulses...No he didn't. He doubts the flex plate or crank float is the problem (even though he hasn't checked the long pulse) and suggests changing the main loom for £400. The owner asked me if I wanted to buy the car, er no thanks! I reckon I could fix it by changing the engine (and making sure the replacement engine comes with a flex plate) but I don't want to change another engine. On this model car it's almost just as easy to change the engine if the gearbox has to come off so I wouldn't just change the flex plate while I had it in bits I'd change the engine to rule out crank float and bearings at the same time as flex plate.

Morat wrote:

Well, it's about time I came over for an LPG service on the P38 if you want to hook up diagnostics to it while I'm there - no worries.
How are you fixed?

Hi Miles!

A busy week next week but may be able to do Friday 19th if we could play that one by ear... Could do Fri 26th for sure, may be able to do an earlier day that week too. Any problems with it? Yes we can try the Launch on it if you don't mind.