Stainless Steel in LPG Tanks Application 2004-01-0888

LPG is today an alternative and ecological fuel energy for automotive. Conventional LPG tanks show their limits and the development of new LPG tanks faces some difficulties: small and complicated shapes in the vehicles are available to store LPG tanks and the weight of conventional LPG tanks remains high. Based on a new LPG concept patented by Giat Industries, Ugine&ALZ proposed the usage of a high strength stainless steel. This new concept is based on internal reinforcing wells and on the use of high-strength stainless steel. Therefore the tank can have various shapes exactly adapted to the available space in the vehicle. As a consequence the space in the vehicle is optimised. Moreover using high-strength stainless steel enables to reduce the weight of the tank considerably. This article describes this new LPG tank concept and its main advantages: LPG storage capacity, lightness, burst pressure resistance, crash resistance…