Natural-Gas Powered Pickups Coming

[enzo1]

[enzo1]

[RWebb]

that leaves plenty of room to haul your TSP for the dishwasher and your cases of old timely incandescent light bulbs

[GH85Carrera]

And lots of room for baby seal pelts and spotted owl meat.

[vash]

great, just great.

more proof that i cannot afford to save more gas.

[hardflex]

TX is the 2nd most populous State in the Union.
over half the vehicles registered in TX are over 6000lb GVW and an avg MPG of ????

If you just convert TX over, you've made a sizeable dent in Gasoline consumption.

[hardflex]

BTW most I see driving around have NOTHING in the bed.

[David]

Why not a 4.5 liter diesel half ton pickup. I'd buy one tomorrow.

[rattlsnak]

Dodge has had CNG trucks for 10+ years, but they are only available to fleet customers.

[HHI944]

So, will there be an attachment so I can recharge the tanks of farts??

[porsche4life]

Dodge? I've never seen one on the market... Ford has made CNG only and bifuel trucks off and on for the last 20yrs . Chevy made bifuel trucks for the early 2000s and stopped around 2006...

Chesapeak is willing to commit to buy their entire fleet from whichever manufacturer will make a factory bifuel truck....

Looks like this dodge is CNG only though, which is a major bummer. Our Chevy has a standard gas tank, and a 20gallon CNG tank. We get 200mi of CNG range, and the normal range on the 34 gallon gas tank.

[rattlsnak]

Yep, Dodge. Atlanta Gas Light Company has a big fleet of them since the mid 90's. The fleet vehicles for sale were CNG and gas, but the internal fleet were all CNG.
And yes they also have diesels running on CNG...

[porsche4life]

Umm, there are virtually no CNG or bifuel dodges on the market used. If AGL is using them, they are most likely conversion...


And the diesels running CNG are running are injecting it in a blend with the diesel. Like a 50/50 mix...

[jyl]

Dodge Ram will be CNG 250 mile range plus gasoline 120 mile range, has both sets of tanks, I'm posting from memory (read the article a couple of days ago) so don't hold me to those exact numbers. I guess it could work for fleets, that's who uses CNG now. Seems like a non-starter for most consumers, how many are going to give up half the pickup bed for CNG tanks?

[porsche4life]

It works fine for us. We use side boxes for our tools. Very rarely do we haul 8ft sheets. We use ladder racks to haul long pipe and our ladders. The fuel savings more than make up for it. We can fuel up in most of the towns we go to. Not an issue, and much cheaper.

[jyl]

There is a lot of room under the body of a full size truck, between the frame rails. I wonder why they couldn't fit the CNG tanks down there. It would seem more sanitary.

[porsche4life]

Umm, under there is already the regular fuel tank. And the CNG tanks can't be conformed to fit around things. They have to be the cylindrical shape to hold that pressure....

[Joe Bob]

Fleet CNGs have been around for 20 years. The US has a crapload of natural gas, they can convert coal to NG, they can tap landfills for NG.....nothing new.

But if you put NEW AND IMPROVED on it.....it might sell......but then again, ya gotta convince the gas stations to carry the stuff.....

[porsche4life]

Lotsa stations already carry it in some parts of the country. Check CNGnow, and go to OK.... Chesapeake is a major producer, and their entire fleet is CNG, they are pushing for it in OK big time.

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by David

Why not a 4.5 liter diesel half ton pickup. I'd buy one tomorrow.

The cost ratio is about 3 to 1 for diesel per BTU. For Gasoline it is about 4 to 1. CNG right now is cheap!