LPG Cars

What are LPG cars like to drive?

Driving an LPG car is not significantly different to using a conventional car. The controls remain largely unchanged: starting, engaging and stopping the engine are all done in the normal way. The main additions are a switch, usually located by the gear lever or on the dashboard, which enables the driver to select auto gas or petrol operation, and a fuel gauge that shows the remaining amount of both fuels. However, compared to petrol performance, drivers of bi-fuel cars may notice a small loss of power at full throttle when in gas fuel mode. Under most driving conditions, however, the difference is hardly discernable.

LPG cars save money!

From today, Kia Motors Corp. is offering an LPG version of its city car Morning.

For now, the Morning LPI is the only passenger car that runs on auto gas available to able-bodied consumers, as GM Daewoo Auto and Technology Co., the country's only other carmaker with a city car in its lineup, will not be introducing an LPG-run version until next year.

Until now, the use of auto gas had been limited to cars with seven or more seats and passenger cars used for commercial purposes. The use of gas-powered passenger cars for private purposes was restricted to people with disabilities. Revised regulations allowing the use of auto gas in city cars and hybrid electric vehicles were implemented on April 17 last year.

Beginning at 8.71 million won ($6,260), as opposed to 7.32 million won for the most basic trim of the gasoline version with no options, the Morning LPI comes with a significantly larger price tag.

However, when the price of the fuel is factored in, the initial disparity can be balanced out relatively quickly.

The Morning LPI fitted with automatic transmission manages 13.4 kilometers on a liter of LPG and the fuel economy of the gasoline version is 16.6 kilometers per liter.

By dividing the average daily mileage of 44.3 kilometers recorded by personal automobiles in 2006 by the fuel economies of the two versions of the car shows that the Morning LPI would require about 3.3 liters of gas per day while the gasoline version would consume about 2.7 liters per day.

A simple multiplication of the daily fuel consumption figures with average prices of the two fuels shows that the owner of a Morning LPI would spend 2,844 won per day on fuel while the owner of the conventional Morning spends 4,206 won on fuel each day. Fuel prices are based on the Korea National Oil Corp.'s figures published for Seoul on Wednesday that showed that auto gas cost on average 861.74 won per liter and the price of non-premium gasoline was 1,557.68 won per liter.

Over the course of a year, the average fuel bill for the Morning LPI would be 1.04 million won and the gasoline-powered version 1.54 million won.

That leads to savings of 3 million won over 6.7 years, the average lifespan of city cars in Korea, although fuel prices and efficiency are likely to change oevr time.

In addition helping pennywise drivers save money, the Morning LPI, or any LPG-powered automobile, is a good option for the environmentally conscientious.

According to the Korea LPG Association, research have shown that LPG produces the smallest amount of carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide per kilometer among the three main fuel types -- LPG, gasoline and diesel.

According to carmakers' data, a gasoline-powered vehicle emits up to 14 grams more carbon dioxide per kilometer than the equivalent LPG car.

Another noteworthy feature of the Morning LPI is that Kia Motors seem to have overcome the problem of LPG cars having lower power output. The power outputs of Korean carmakers' LPG vehicles are up to 30 brake horsepower lower than that of their gasoline counterparts.

The Morning LPI, however, boasts a power output of 67 brake horsepower, which is 3 brake horsepower higher than that of the gasoline version.