Browse Forums Kitchen Corner 1 Oct 29, 2008 4:42 pm We've just been told that there is no gas main near our house. It will cost us approx $5000 or $6000 to connect. OUCH ! Our only option is to install bottled gas or go with electricity.
I love cooking with gas. !!!! 1.Does anyone use bottled gas ? 2.Is it as powerful coming out of the burners? Can it effectively boil pasta? 3.How well do lpg-using cooktops work? Any ideas, guys? OR is there a website I can check out that can provide unbiassed answers? Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 2Oct 29, 2008 6:31 pm I have lived in a few houses with bottled gas and never had a problem with the pressure...lots of restaurants use propane and they don't seem to have any problems, even with those king hell wok burners.
The appliances you use just need to be re-jetted to suit LPG, which is a basic proceedure that can be done by any gas fitter or the suppliers themselves if your appliances are new. When we bought our last range of display tops they even came with extra sets of jets for propane. Cheers, Earl Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 3Oct 29, 2008 6:34 pm Strumer I have lived in a few houses with bottled gas and never had a problem with the pressure...lots of restaurants use propane and they don't seem to have any problems, even with those king hell wok burners. The appliances you use just need to be re-jetted to suit LPG, which is a basic proceedure that can be done by any gas fitter or the suppliers themselves if your appliances are new. When we bought our last range of display tops they even came with extra sets of jets for propane. Cheers, Earl I do a fair bit of wok cooking as well. So are you suggesting that the high heat required for this, is possible ? Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 4Oct 29, 2008 6:46 pm I am not a gasfitter, but I am pretty sure that the pressure inside a standard LPG canister is well in excess of the requirements of any domestic appliance...after all, they still require regulators on them before the gas enters the circuit.
If a gas bottle can pump a decent flame in a BBQ or an outdoor heater it shouldn't be any different in a domestic system. I have seen industrial size wok burners running off bottled gas in a couple of countries out side of Australia where street line natural gas is not available. The only time I have seen pressure below the requirements of a system was in a house where the natural gas line from the street was underspecified for running more than one appliance at the same time - i.e. the hot water system, the gas central heater and the stove all at once. Maybe someone else here will prove me wrong, but it can't hurt to talk with a plumber or go into a trade centre such as BOC if there is one near you. Cheers, Earl Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 5Oct 29, 2008 7:49 pm Southies we are on bottled gas in this rental and We had a natural gas cook top and oven in our last house. The only concerning difference is price. LPG bottled gas is more expensive than natural gas. Perhaps you might want to consider electric for your oven and gas just for the cook top if you have to go bottled gas.
Also what are you doing about your hot water system? Because LPG is so expensive here we were advised to have an electric boost on our Solar HW system rather than a gas boost.. Again we had a natural gas HWS in our last house and it was wonderful. We have an LPG gas system here ( both times instantaneous) and it is very disappointing although this might be due to placement of the unit to bathrooms and the bottom end quality of the unit. Having only access to LPG might also effect what you do for house heating as well. Lots to consider. If I'd had the option I'd definitely have paid to be connected to natural gas as I prefer to cook with gas as well. Blog http://wherethehearthis.blogspot.com/ Build https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?t=6634: Yard https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=27687&p=378401#p378401 Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 6Oct 29, 2008 8:06 pm What about an induction cook top. That is what I have brought as we don't have gas in our street (the gas was over $10,000 to bring it to our house)
Induction has a similar control as gas, I love cooking and could not go the electric cook top as we have one in the house we are renting and I curse every time I use it. We now have a blog. http://allaboutthebuild.blogspot.com/ Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 7Oct 29, 2008 8:10 pm I'm probably not much help.... but I'd just go with the option of connecting to the mains. What will your heating be southies? Yeah even though it's a BIG ouch... I'd suck it up and sacrifice something else.
Jo I leave you to fend for yourself, figure things out yourself. Terrence Malick Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 8Oct 29, 2008 8:19 pm Our old house was not on mains gas and we had gas bottles, when we replaced the stove in 2000 we didn't have to do anything to make it workable with the bottled gas, perhaps the installers did it without us realising just a standard gas cooktop, worked fine.
Big problem with bottled gas though is that it is very expensive form of gas, if you are planning to live in house a long time, a lot of that initial connection would pay for itself in the long run:? Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 9Oct 29, 2008 8:40 pm Helyn LPG gas stoves have different fittings. Not sure if they sell them ready for LPG or if the fitter adapts them but you can get things converted. At least in terms of room heaters. I know we decided not to bring our old heater with us because it wasn't worth getting it adapted for LPG.
As for danma's suggestion of an induction cook top ( electric) then you have to have the right cooking pots. I know we did consider this but I didn't want to have to buy new pots and pans and DH flatly refused to consider doing so anyway. They are supposed to give a very even heat with lots of control though. Might be the thing for you Southies. Really depends on what else you would use the gas for. if lots of things I'd suck up the cost of going natural gas. Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 10Oct 29, 2008 8:52 pm Thanks Kexkez, Joles, Helyn :
Tossing up between paying for the gas mains connection OR LPG cooktop with electric boost on a Solar HW system. DH has googled & found that elect hot water tank + solar panels can cost anywhere b/t $2500 & $5000, depending on the tank size, no of panels, etc.. If the 2 systems are comparable in price, then definitely the gas mains. HANG ON !!!! What happens if we pay the $6,000 gas connection fee ? Does that mean we are subsidising the rest of the street for their gas installatoin ? Danma : I'd love an induction cooktop but tooooo expensive, plus extra for pots...big bucks. Strumer : might just do that & ask some tradies Thanks, all........will wait for builder to get bakc to us with the quote to install the line to the gas mains Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 11Oct 29, 2008 10:55 pm Hi Southies,
We use bottled gas for cooking, and yes it is more expensive than natural gas, but we would go through maybe 1x45kg bottle in a year or maybe a bit more (can't say exactly as this is the first year we haven't used gas for heating too). We also do a lot of wok cooking and it's fine. We don't have natural gas in our area either, but I am still thinking about gas boosted solar hot water...hmmm might have to do my sums though. I think we pay something like $120 for a bottle and then we have to pay for hire of the bottles as well (but I can't remember how much)...I'm not sure how this compares to electric, but I wouldn't use anything else for my cooktop! 'chelle We have a hand-over date...15/10...but I won't hold my breath! http://people-in-glass-houses.blogspot.com/ Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 13Oct 30, 2008 10:02 pm good choice.
I;ve run a house on a bottle gas stove no probs, and also runa cafe's large kitchen stove and hot water service on bottled gas not problems. And if you do a good evacuated tubes solar system with a gas booster and the gas stove on gas bottles U should be fine. Steve Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 14Oct 30, 2008 10:56 pm Yak_Chat good choice. I;ve run a house on a bottle gas stove no probs, and also runa cafe's large kitchen stove and hot water service on bottled gas not problems. And if you do a good evacuated tubes solar system with a gas booster and the gas stove on gas bottles U should be fine. Steve Steve, are you saying that we can have a solar panel HWS boosted by bottled gas ? we were thinking an off peak electric with solar panels might be cheaper, to install & to run. Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 16Oct 30, 2008 11:43 pm yes you can Southies. ( lpg with solar) We were advised it wasn't as efficient but that might have been because of our location etc Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 18Nov 01, 2008 6:25 pm OK, so sounds like the supplier or installer made sure our stove was suitable for bottled gas without us realising or remembering that this was done. Seemed a standard gas cooktop to me, and certainly was not an expensive model.
I clarify what I said about cost: cooking alone is not costly to run, a bottle would last us all summer, but when winter came and we used the gas heater in the dining room we ran thru them fairly quickly - in fact this dining room was our lounge room before we extended and as such we had heater on in morning and then again in evening, sometimes a bottle only lasted 3 weeks Also, at least in our area, you had to pay a yearly rental on the bottles too, and we had 2 bottles so we weren't caught short if one ran out on weekend, this cost nearly $50 a year and last bottle we bought in Aug this year cost $100, for 45 kg size. Re: Bottled/LPG gas supply ILO mains 20Nov 01, 2008 7:40 pm We've a family holiday house that has a gas stove with the LPG gas bottles, It works fantastically !!! better than our electric ceramic cooktop at home...booo hooo, I miss cooking with gas.
As the others have said, cooking is cheap with LPG, but heating is shocking ! Friends of mine live near our holiday place and they have to use LPG for everything, cooking, heating and hotwater, they go through a bottle a month in winter - costs $150 - $200 per bottle !!!!!!! Yep, everything is more expensive in WA, add more if you live in the Country. ( the petrol is always about 25cents more a litre than Perth too, geez those counrty towns are a rip off huh ?) Maybe it's something you can save up for later.... Thanks for info, yes met with Power Utility, Builder's Site Supervisor and Electrician on site and aligned on the mains connection. Seems like the builder and Electrician… 2 10031 if it's the look that you're not happy with, the easiest option would probably be to spray paint it all into the same color as the walls so it blends in. there might not… 3 3084 That's a fantastic result! Happy you got it sorted out. cheers Simeon 6 7532 |