Bottle Connections SPain & Portugal

[doonhamer]

Thanks to help through this Forum I have now fitted a French regulator system in my Hymer and am now heading of for two months in Spain & Portugal. I'm hoping that the two 13 kg French bottles will be enough for the trip but just in case does anyone know if its easy to adapt French pigtails to suit either a Spanish or Portugese bottle.

[Derek Uzzell]

According to Gaslow's leaflet the French connection for their 13kg steel bottles is the same as that of a UK 4.5kg Calor-type butane bottle. To convert this connection to allow a Spanish or Portugese bottle to be used involves adding a 'Jumbo Adapter'.

 

On that basis, I think it's just a matter of you obtaining one of these Jumbo Adapters in Spain (or Portugal) and screwing it on to the end of your present pigtail. I'd expect the adapters to be readily available in Spain and Portugal, but hopefully someone whose been there and used those countries' bottles can confirm this.

[starvin marvin]

I guess you have a fixed regulator fixed within your gas locker. If so this will make it more difficult to obtain Spanish gas, but not impossible. If you have a regulator on top of the gas cylinder this is the easiest as all you need is a Spanish regulator which are readily avalible in ironmongers., plus of course a bottle which you can easy pick up from a flea market. Refills are everywhere and Repsol bottles are available in Portugal.

 

If you have the fixed regulator this is more difficult because you will need a "regulator" to fit the top of the Spanish cylinder. This "regulator" is just a dummy with no "guts" in it and then you need a connector hose to link to your "French" regulator. These are only available from proper gas agents who will test your system and approve it prior to selling you the kit you need.

 

Get a camping gaz 907 or two before you leave as a back up. I've spent some time with a Kiwi who's Adria had two Slovenian bottles and I can tell you that getting this sorted was difficult but he eventually did get it sorted and now has a Spanish set up plus he's using a french bottle left behind by a Scots couple.

 

Gavin if you read this that bottle of yours still has gas in it!!

[Derek Uzzell]

I'm surprised that suitable French-to-Spanish/ Portuguese connection pigtail-adapters aren't more easily obtainable in Spain, but it's certainly worth knowing that this isn't the case.

 

I did notice that, in my French accessory catalogues, pigtail adapters were offered to convert a standard French pigtail so that non-French gas-cylinders could be used, but a Spain/Portugal adapter was not advertised. I did wonder at the time whether this was significant, but thought no more of it.

 

There seems to be no problem obtaining a 'Jumbo Adapter' in the UK. There are plenty of suppliers and there's a picture of the adapter on:

 

http://www.caravanning-online.co.uk/acatalog/Cylinder_Adaptors.html#a01_2d1671

 

Evidently, for anyone planning to use Spanish/Portuguese bottles and whose motorhome has a fixed 30mbar regulator, it might be best to obtain the necessary conversion bits before visiting those countries.

[starvin marvin]

Well done Derek, the jumbo adaptor shown in the Calor listing is exactly the right thing needed plus the "pigtail" if you have the fixed regulator to use Spanish bottles and can be very difficult to source in Spain, unless you are lucky or maybe a fluent Spanish speaker. So get the kit in the UK before you leave

 

Then all you need is the bottle to go with it. This can also be difficult, as I've said before the easiest way is the flea market to source an empty or sometimes a partially full bottle for between 10 to 20E.

[BGD]

There's maybe a couple more things to add about bottled gas in Spain.

 

Sure, almost everyone here in Spain uses the 15kg Orange Repsol gas bottles, in their homes, but the bottle dimensions are quite big...I guess too tall/wide to fit into most MH gas cupboards. These are the bottles that loads of people sell second hand at car boot sales etc over here for maybe 10 euros each.

 

The mini-bottles (from memory, about 8 kgs, also available from almost every Repsol garage) are much more likely to be the ones that you can use in most Motorhomes.

However, unlike the 15kg bottles, you don't tend to see these mini- bottles at fleamarkets etc at all, so you'll probably have to actually buy one or two from a Repsol garage.

They've also started doing the mini-bottles in plastic bodies, which make them a lot lighter.

We have two of these mini-bottles in our Motorhome gas cupboard - one hooked up, and the other ready as a reserve.

 

 

 

Also, a thought occurs to me about the regulator and flexible pipe that attaches to these Spanish bottles.

In Spain, the push-on connection to the top of the bottle is also the gas regulator, so by the time the gas leaves this and enteres the flexible hose pipe into the Van, it's pressure has already been regulated down.

But if you have a UK Van with a fixed gas regulator on the bulhead, could there be problems if you then also fit a length of flexible hose onto that with a Spanish push-on bottle connector/regulator on the other end of it too?

I'm thinking that the gas would then be running through two regulators before it gets to the appliances inside the Motorhome. Does this cause pressure problems at those appliances?

 

 

[starvin marvin]

Sorry BGD but you've not read the thread properly. Derek as usual is correct. The jumbo adaptor is basically a regulator body with no guts, just used to enable a connection to be made to the bottle. Just requires a pigtail.

 

Doon already has 2no 13 kg bottles in his locker so no problem fitting orange Repsol bottles in, many m/h's carry Spanish bottles. The plastic bottles are smaller but fatter and should also easily fit. The smaller aluminium bottles are harder to find at flea markets.

[BGD]

starvin marvin - 2009-01-03 3:36 PM

 

Sorry BGD but you've not read the thread properly. Derek as usual is correct. The jumbo adaptor is basically a regulator body with no guts, just used to enable a connection to be made to the bottle. Just requires a pigtail.

 

Doon already has 2no 13 kg bottles in his locker so no problem fitting orange Repsol bottles in, many m/h's carry Spanish bottles. The plastic bottles are smaller but fatter and should also easily fit. The smaller aluminium bottles are harder to find at flea markets.

 

 

I had in fact understood that the "jumbo-adaptor" was simply a connector but with no regulator built in.

But the point I saught to highlight was that the "connectors" that others on this thread have mentioned buying in any Spanish DIY type store are not. They have their own regulator built in.

 

Apologies, I should have made it clearer that it is these "Spanish purchased" ones that might(?) give UK Motorhomers a problem when over here due to the "double-regulating" effect.

[Derek Uzzell]

Came across the following

 

http://www.aidecampingcar.com/forumO/viewtopic.php?t=10178&view=previous&sid=dee77bbbc12e882d163fda11f04a47be

 

that includes a question much the same as doonhamer's, producing a similar response.

 

Apparently the Repsol bottles used in Spain can also be obtained in the south-west of France together with the necessary high-pressure pigtail adapter. The photos show an adapter fitted to the end of a Truma SecuMotion pigtail.

 

I'd guess that having two gas-regulators in line astern might allow enough gas through to run a low-demand appliance (a fridge, say), but I'm doubtful over how well a hob, oven, or heater would work.

 

I remember a forum inquiry (a good few years ago) relating to a gas 'defect' that was eventually pinned down to a gas-bottle change-over device with integrated regulator having been added to a Laika motorhome without having first removed the inconspicuously-mounted original regulator. If I recall correctly, the 'double regulator' arrangement worked OK until high gas-flow was needed.