Cpg vs lpg on stove - Cpg more available now?

[mlydon]

Had a fire on my kerosene stove the other day - sealing gasket blew out on the oven burner, causing yellow (raw) kero flame in addition to the vaporizrd burnet. I killed the feed to the stove, but it kept burning for 10 minutes, and in fact started getting LARGER! Once flame started going up the back side of the stove, instead of containing itself near the leaking burner, it was time to pull an extinguisher and douse it. Only the hot burner kept re- igniting the fire. Ultimately I had to dump a pot of water into the oven immediately after dousing the flame with a second extinguisher (went though the entire first one).

While the fire didn't kill me, the cleanup after almost did ;-)

In any case, the experience has seriously put me off kerosene, as you can imagine. I'm not too fond of the idea of LPG, either, due to the need for sniffers, risk of explosion, etc.

I've seen posts here putting down Cpg gas as a real pain to get hold of, but most of those posts are somewhat old. With the current push for Cpg powered vehicles, has this become easier? I ran across a gent here in block island the other day who said Cpg can be mailed, had a nice littlen2 burner unit.....

My plans are for coastal cruising in the us northeast - no tunesia for my foreseeable future.

Thoughts?

Thanks,

Matt

[sailorchic34]

Hum well if you mean compressed natural gas. There are stations about here and there, but not so easy to fine from a cruising boat. And they are not in many smaller towns at all..

CNG is stored at a much higher pressure as a gas, so the regulator will be different. Plus tank construction is different as your storing CNG at 3000 to 4000 PSIG. Propane is a liquid at 100-150 psig depending on temperature. Propane has about 93 times the btu's per gallon of storage compared to CNG. So 93 gallons (volumn) of CNG will about equal 1 gallon of liquid propane

Natural gas will generally need one pipe size larger for the same length of run. This due to the less BTU's per CF and lower operating pressure at 7" wc. Propane runs somewhere between 11" and 14" WC.

CNG big plus is it lighter then air so will not fill the bilge with gas. Big plus. Propane is of course heavier then air.

Using a propane sniffer (I have on in the engine / lazzarette spaces) is a fairly safe compromise when using propane.

In my book CNG offers one nice safety point and a whole lota trouble with added costs for installation, the need for larger storage tank and finding the filling stations.

[sailorchic34]

OK for the little camping cylinders with CPG, well its still propane (sometimes butane) and has all the issues of liquid propane in that its heavier then air as a gas. The small camping cylinders can be shipped but pricey for the limited amount of propane in them. Way more expensive then larger CNG or the simpler LPG systems.

They are used for camping, so you could find them in larger towns, etc. But not really safer then LPG.

A standard 20# propane cylinder (mines on deck) is available everywhere, both in exchange and fill stations. the little CPG cylinders are pretty much a one shot. Some are butane btw, but not really any safer then propane