Surprising increase in truck MPG

As we approach $4 per gallon, I'm considering removing the roof rack from my Blazer.

That silly thing has got to cost 2 or 3 mpg!

Richard

Reply to
cavelamb himself
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I remember a news show (60 Minutes?) about that a few years ago. The EPROMS in the pump computers were rigged to short - except at

5, 10, and 15 gallons, which is what teh inspectors looks at when "certifying" the pumps.

Ain't technology great!

Richard

Reply to
cavelamb himself

pyotr filipivich wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

I normally log location, date, time, odometer reading, # miles travelled, on-board computer guesstimates of distance to empty and fuel economy, elapsed time of operation, # gallons, cost/gallon, total expense.

This way, I can also keep an eye on just how close (if at all) the on-board computer is to reality.

Reply to
RAM

I missed the Staff meeting, but the Memos showed that "RAM³" wrote on Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:03:07 GMT in rec.crafts.metalworking :

Ufda. I log purchase date, odometer, elapsed miles, gallons and cost. OF course, I'm not keeping a daily or trip record, save for my own interests. (special trips.)

Ah, I'm the on board computer. An "Analog self-programming computer which can be assembled by unskilled labor in the dark."

tschus pyotr

Reply to
pyotr filipivich

That may be reality as you wish it to be. Most gasohol is regular gas not the high octane you imagine. Most cars are tuned to run well on regular gas and they would get poor gas mileage if the alcohol wasn't added to raise the octane to the meet the octane requirements of STANDARD vehicles.

No. Someone on a newsgroup declaring that they are convinced they get poor mileage with E10 fuel is neither fact nor real life. What you describe is merely wishful thinking.

Given that both high gas prices and ethanol are here to stay - you can expect that even if the car you are now driving doesn't get better mileage with alcohol blends, in the future all cars will and most new cars today already do.

more wishful thinking.

What is clear is that statement is based on wishful thinking not facts. How would you know if the gas you are saying is better doesn't have 7% alcohol? And if your comparison is made with equivalent octane fuels then you are comparing low grade gasoline with alcohol added to a higher grade gasoline. If you buy gasohol that has an 87 octane rating the base fuel that the ethanol was added to may have an octane rating of 83 - what kind of mileage would your car be getting with straight 83 octane gasoline if the alcohol had not been added?

The fact is that there have been studies where fair comparisons have shown that you are wrong. The claim that adding 10% alcohol to gasoline reduces gas mileage by 4% due to the calculation that it contains 4% less energy is just plain false. ` Studies that compare regular unleaded to regular gasohol both at 87 octane do show about 0%-1% decrease in mileage. But that isn't a fair comparison. Those studies are not comparing the same gasoline with and without alcohol added.

What your wishful thinking also ignores is that by using alcohol as an octane booster the refinery can save energy by producing lower octane fuel to mix with the alcohol. That energy savings on 87 octane E10 fuel is reported to be around 3.5%. You personally may or may not see that 3% savings but someone is benefiting from that and it does explain why alcohol is here to stay and why almost all gasoline sold at the pump today contains some alcohol. And eventually all drivers and car manufacturers will adapt to that fact.

-jim

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Reply to
jim

Talking of econmy runs, It as just before D day here in the UK in 1944 when your grandfathers and fathers were under canvas all along the S coast. there were some woods opposite where they were camped and a couple of houses down they had their mess and some billetts. they were very kind to me, a 10 yr old at that time, giving me a Nux? bar, American comics such as Superman with Mr. Mxtlplk from cornucopia!! I even had a breakfast of creamed corn, hash browns bacon and eggs!! But what stuck in mt mind was popular mechanics magazine. In that there was an article on how to prepare for an economy run. Every car had just 1 gallon of petrol. Tyres machined so that there was only 2in of tread. thin oil in engine gearbox and axle. Radiator blanked off virtually no breaking, gentle acceleration . and lots of coasting. Some time ago i might add Cant remember much else!!. Such as mpg achieved. It was somewhere in the 60's to 70's mpg. I may be wrong. My parents asked one GI to come in and eat with us. Named Don. We kept in touch after the war when he got back to the USA. Remember it all very well. Does any of this ring a bell? Any one have popular mechanics from that time?

Ted Frater Dorset UK

Reply to
Ted Frater

I have been receiving snail mail Popular Mechanics and Popular Science magazines since the 1950s.I used to subscribe to Mechanix Illustrated and Science and Mechanics magazines too, untill they went belly up.I have read about some of those road trips before, to see which cars could get the best miles per gallon.

Once in a while, I email back and forth with a woman in Bognor Regis, West Sussex County, in England on the South coast.I wonder what things were like there in World War Two.I am sixty six years old.I remember Rationing in America way back then. cuhulin

Reply to
cuhulin

Here are the covers from Popular Mechanics in 1944. Maybe you'll recognize it. May's cover story was "How much oil is left?" They were a little premature. :

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Reply to
Ed Huntress

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>

OOOoooo.....

That one goes on the Proof page! :)

Richard

Reply to
cavelamb himself

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I haven't read it, but a comment I saw said that PM claimed we'd be out of oil by 1955. Too bad the Club of Rome didn't read it; it would have saved them a lot of embarrassment 25 years later. d8-)

Reply to
Ed Huntress

My first exposure to the "out of oil" situation was about 15 years ago. I checked out a book from the Air Force Library - yet another aircraft design book.

In one chapter they were discussing the cost of building and operating future aircraft. It had a graph of domestic and world oil supply. Domestic supply ran out about 2010, world supply about 2025.

Also depicted the Hubbert peak curves - which I later learned more about.

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Scary stuff back then.

And now, it seems to be coming true...

Richard

Reply to
cavelamb himself

Jim, Why is it that YOU are the ONLY one I have ever heard claim that you get better mileage with 10% alcohol. The companies that produce it and push it will tell you straight out that you will LOSE mileage using alcohol, WHY? Because it delivers LESS energy per gallon than straight gasoline (even 85 octane has a higher energy content).

From

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"The most obvious benefit of ethanol-blend fuels is that it decreases our dependence on foreign oil...If we could run our vehicles/engines on

100% ethanol, which has been successful in Brazil - this benefit would be noticeable - Unfortunately since E10 (10% alcohol) results in a 5-7% drop in mpg, our decrease in foreign oil use is minimal.

On so many levels the good intentions of our government over the past 10 years in promoting ethanol, ignored the negative side effects increased ethanol production would cause. For example, several recent studies reveal that the ethanol plants have reached medically unacceptable levels of pollution (increased lung disease) in the vicinity near these plants. This is one serious obstacle we must overcome before we could encourage increased production/distribution of ethanol."

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Notice anything MISSING? Namely a claim to BETTER MILEAGE with Ethanol? You would think that the organization pushing ethanol usage would have that as a prominent item on that page. IF IT WAS TRUE.
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What is E10? E10 is a gasoline/ethanol blend (90 percent unleaded gasoline and 10 percent ethanol or ethyl alcohol).

What are the benefits of E10? E10 lowers carbon monoxide and other tailpipe emissions because it burns cleaner than 100 percent gasoline, maintaining air quality and complying with EPA mandates. E10 helps offset greenhouse gas emissions caused by burning fossil fuels, it biodegradable and does not contaminate ground water supplies.

Hmm, another site pushing ethanol. And again the MISSING mileage increase statement.

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(a LARGE ethanol producer. Surely they would have the "fact" you claim) Renewable: Because ethanol is produced from corn, each new year means a new corn crop and more ethanol. Burns cleaner than gasoline: Reduces harmful tailpipe emissions. Domestically Produced: Enhances the nation's energy security.

Nope Missing there as well....

I Know I'll look at the National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition, They must have tested E10 and E 85. They will have the facts about mileage increases.

What is the range of a flexible fuel vehicle? Response:

Ethanol has less energy content than gasoline. However, E85 also has a much higher octane (ranging from 96 to 105) than gasoline. FFVs are not optimized to E85, so they experience a 10-15% drop in fuel economy. This will vary based on the way one drives, the air pressure in the tires, and additional driving conditions.

OOPS, 10-15% DROP in Mileage...

How about looking at a paper from a state that mandates E10 for vehicles. They will have the straight facts

"According to a recent article, drivers in Honolulu (and perhaps elsewhere) are complaining of reduced gas mileage in the two months since Hawaii switched to gasoline blended with 10% ethanol.

According to the Ethanol Promotion and Information council, most drivers using a 10% ethanol-blended gas will experience a 1-2% drop in mileage.

But some drivers in Hawaii are claiming that their mileage has dropped by 25-30%. While I?ve heard of substantially lower mileage in cars running on E85 (a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline that can be used in certain makes/models) I never really heard anything about reduced mileage in the more ?standard? 90/10 ethanol blend."

Darn, there is that pesky DROP in mileage again.

Snipped a bunch of BS here.

Snip more BS

Snip of MORE BS

So jim, Should I post a few more ACTUAL TESTS and information links from a few HUNDREDS more Ethanol manufacturers and green fuel sites. OR would you care to admit that YOU are the one doing the "wishful thinking"

Reply to
Steve W.

Because you don't pay attention? You are asking me to explain your lack of knowledge?

Here is an article by motor trend:

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They claim that eventually alcohol mixed with gasoline will replace all unleaded regular because with the appropriate engine designs it will produce better mileage. Right now some cars do better with alcohol mixes and some don't. But this article claims eventually all cars will be designed to do better on gasohol. They think that recent tests indicate the ideal mix will be 20-30%.

If you believe that it is simply a matter of putt Ethanol's energy content was not found to be a direct predictor of fuel economy. A fuel's energy content in British Thermal Units (Btu) is current standard practice for estimating fuel economy, a method that, because of ethanol's lower Btu value, leads to estimates of decreased fuel economy in proportion to the percentage of ethanol in the fuel blend.

-- This research, however, did not find ethanol's Btu content to be a direct predictor of fuel economy. All four vehicles tested exhibited better fuel economy with the ethanol blends than the Btu-value estimates predicted.

Anybody can pull numbers out of thin air. There have been numerous studies done and none have found E10 to reduce mileage by 5-7%. But If you car gets bad mileage on ethanol - I guess you are going to have to get used to that.

So an ethanol plant is more toxic than an oil refinery - yeah right. And you believe that?

You claim that adding ethanol to regular gasoline will result in less miles per gallon. That is not true. Studies have proved that. However the E10 gasoline you get at the gas pump is NOT regular gasoline plus alcohol. What it is is a very low grade fuel that the alcohol boosts the octane to the same level as regular. The reason you don't get better mileage on that mix is not because of the alcohol but because of the other 90% of the fuel. If you tried to run the gasoline straight that they mix with ethanol you wouldn't be complaining about ethanol.

-jim

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Reply to
jim

NO, Jim I claim that your assertion of "Numerous studies have shown increased mileage using ethanol" is BULL.

Lets see I posted 6 items from ethanol producers and people who have a vested interest in ethanol use in the world. They ALL would like even more ethanol use in vehicles, And EVERY one of them shows that ethanol added to gasoline causes a measurable mileage DROP. Now you CLAIM these companies are wrong?

Sorry but I trust the companies over someone who shows ONE article by a magazine which itself says that EVENTUALLY this MAY HAPPEN?

"THEY CLAIM that EVENTUALLY alcohol mixed with gasoline will replace all unleaded regular because with the appropriate engine designs it will produce better mileage. Right now some cars do better with alcohol mixes and some don't. But this article claims eventually all cars will be designed to do better on gasohol. THEY THINK that recent tests indicate the ideal mix will be 20-30%."

But just because a MAGAZINE CLAIMS it might happen EVENTUALLY, makes you correct?

Gee, I guess that because Eventually earth people MAY go to Mars and set up a colony I should get ready to move.

Sorry, not going to happen.

Reply to
Steve W.

The studies I refer that show increase mileage are comparing the same gasoline with and without ethanol. That is fleet vehicles where they added the ethanol to the gasoline. All vehicles used the same gasoline with or without alcohol added. That means the 2 fuels have different octanes. That isn't the same as comparing 2 different fuels at the same octane. The general consensus is that comparing E10 to gasoline at the same octane available at service stations today results in around 1% loss in mileage. That is just an average of a lot of studies - some show small gains - some show small losses. Even that small loss is likely to go away as new car technology adapts to the reality that all fuel will soon contain alcohol. Many of the studies that have been done are comparing the two types of fuel at the pump. That isn't the same thing as taking the same gas and adding alcohol. In other word the gasoline portion is not the same. But what those comparisons don't reveal is that the refineries are saving about 3% by not having to increase the octane content of the gasoline portion of the mix. So there still is a net energy gain even if the driver isn't the one seeing it.

You are inventing words that were never said. First you say you can't find anything they say on the subject. Now you conclude that means they support your otherwise unsupported claims.

You like to compare apples and oranges? If you want to prove that you lose mileage with ethanol I don't doubt you. But that proves one thing only - that you are a loser. It doesn't prove every one is a loser much as you would like to believe that. And you seem to think ethanol usage is not going to continue to increase by simply wishing it won't.

The magazine was referring to recently released study on the question. Yes they were drawing conclusions from the research, but the conclusions were pretty obvious. You haven't said one thing that makes me incorrect. All you have some convoluted logic about what you think the ethanol industry thinks.

-jim

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Reply to
jim

No I point out that using YOUR logic they are very silent on a topic that could be bringing them a lot of money. Seems strange that a large company would turn down profits.

Jim, What is your answer to this?

A company that produces ethanol and would receive major financial gain for their product is listing a LOT of reasons why you should use ethanol. Now this same company does testing and concludes that by posting the results of the testing that ethanol use will increase and they will make a larger profit. So they post how is a great thing for the environment. The promote how it will create more jobs, keep money in the country and improve the air.

However on all the different sites, by a lot of large ethanol producing companies there is nothing about how it will improve fuel mileage.

What is the current buzzword in the auto industry? MILEAGE. Everyone is talking about how many MPGs they get. How green they are. How many hybrids and flex-fuel vehicles they make.

Now if ethanol added to gasoline is increasing mileage and you are running the company and can make a profit off this information. Wouldn't it be one of the highlights in your press kit? Wouldn't you be running adds all over telling how you can save the environment AND get better gas mileage as well?

Why is it I see a LOT of press on magnets, acetone, water injection, high mileage oils, and a plethora of gadgets ALL of which make higher mpg claims, and yet NOTHING from large companies like ADM about ethanol increasing mileage? In fact ADM and many of the other major ethanol producers publish data that show that it reduces fuel mileage, and even the same group who did the study shown in Motor Trend says that on their own site. Tests done using identical REAL world vehicles show the mileage decrease. Most of those who have actually driven using the blends also report losing mileage as well. They also warn of the minor detail that diversion of the feed-stocks for ethanol production is raising food prices, hurting our trade with other nations and that it is not possible to produce enough ethanol to fuel the U.S. using available land.

As for increased ethanol usage, it is a stopgap measure at best. Although at least it is an actual energy source, unlike hydrogen or propane or grid charged vehicles.

You claim that the MT article allows you to draw conclusions easily. If you like to base conclusions on "eventually" and "possibly" and "maybe in the future" I guess the article says what you wish it to say.

I live in the real world of today not the "eventually" and "maybe in the future" world.

100 years ago the push was to limit foreign involvement, create a new clean burning fuel source and decrease consumer costs. The articles at that time were touting solar power, water power and wind power. All of which said that the technology will be available "eventually" and "sometime in the future" Always these large advances which are "just a few years away" or "in the future".

Well I've had enough of this and figure the rest of the folks here have as well.

Reply to
Steve W.

Ethanol producers are not a large company - ADM stopped building ethanol plants when the Federal hand outs for doing so ended a decade ago. Most ethanol plants are now being built and owned by farm coops. Farmers own the production plants. They make money by growing corn and converting it to ethanol and various feed products which they sell. I don't see how they would make any more money by making claims that would obviously confuse folks like you. Can you explain how that would make them a single penny? If they tried to explain the intricacies of the petroleum and energy markets to someone like yourself - I would say that would be a mission impossible. If anyone is going to start pushing the mileage benefits of ethanol it will be car manufactures. That will undoubtedly start to happen as widespread availability of gasohol becomes nationwide. When some manufacturer says this car gets 4% better mileage on E10 and other cars don't you can bet that will be something that affects profits. Of course it won't be long before every manufacturer is claiming the same.

And how does the ethanol industry silence on mileage entitle you to make false claims? Today there is a market for all the ethanol that is produced. The ethanol producers have no control over the contents of the other 90% of the fuel that is not ethanol. The question of whether or not your car gets better mileage if the ethanol were removed is really a moot point. That gasoline that is being mixed with ethanol is not available to the public in the straight unmixed form so no real comparison is available.

That doesn't entitle you to claim that adding ethanol to regular gasoline will reduces gas mileage (5-7%), because that statement has been proven false.

Or maybe you are just jumping to a completely bogus conclusion. You have no facts to support your twisted reasoning. It is clearly based on what you wish facts to be. You simply are ignorant of what the ethanol industry is doing and you are extrapolating from your ignorance.

Maybe they are selling their product to a market by the tankerful and not to a mail order market from adverts on the internet or the backs of magazines you read. Did that ever occur to you?

Yes I have seen the original study they referred to and over all the average mileage was a very slight decrease from regular unleaded and alcohol mix. But the interesting thing that Motor Trend extracted from the data was that each car they tested did better than regular straight gasoline at some mix level. Some did better at E30 some at E20 and some at E10. And also as they said at any level of mix all the cars did much better than the BTU content would predict. There conclusion was -> when the technology catches up there will be no question that ethanol increases gas mileage. And of course as I said this study was made not comparing the same gasoline with and without alcohol. It was comparing low-octane gasoline with added alcohol compared to higher octane gasoline with no alcohol. If you would include the energy that was saved at the refinery producing the low octane portion of the alcohol mix then this study also demonstrates that ethanol is still the clear winner.

More acreage was planted to corn in the 1940's than is today. Gasohol is a mix that benefits agriculture as well as the petroleum industry as well as the politicians. The public's interests always comes last because the public is composed of sheep. Today all the federal subsidies for ethanol are in the form of payments to the oil companies for every gallon used. The Feds have decided that ethanol is the best means of achieving clean air and water goals. That is a debatable political claim. But there is really not much else on the table that has much promise to achieve environmental goals and not cause huge increases in the cost of energy. That makes ethanol's position in the market intractable unless someone can persuade the public to abandon those environmental goals. Whether or not the environmental benefits are the best argument for ethanol may well be an open question but the ethanol interests don't have any thing to gain by upsetting the apple cart so they push the environmental benefits. It doesn't really matter if they get blamed for poor mileage it won't affect profits.

See that is wishful thinking. It is a certainty that gasoline at filling stations without alcohol added will be very rare in the near future (it's actually pretty rare in most places already). Ethanol isn't going to replace all petroleum usage. Nobody realistically believes that, but it is here to stay. This is not a passing fad. It would be pretty much impossible to reverse the current trends at this point.

You just made that all up, but even if true - so what? A hundred years ago people were arguing that a transportation system based on gasoline was a passing fad.

$10/gal gasoline will change lots of things and it won't be far in the future.

-jim

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Reply to
jim

"Miles-per-tankful" is practically meaningless... especially if you judge your gas stops according to GM's randomly wandering fuel gauges. Your tank should hold 26 gallons plus about a gallon in the filler neck. Everything I have ever seen published said "26 gallon tank":

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If you occasionally run it down further and put 26.5 gallons in when you are used to only putting 21.5 gallons in... you would go about 23% further. It sounds like the high gas prices have you waiting longer to fill up... hoping for a miracle? >;-} I have been running mostly E85 (85% ethanol) in my Silverado for about a year, and my mileage is down 16% (2.6 mpg) in a "semi-controlled" test (same gas pump, same stretch of highway, same weather, cruise control on 75 mph for 70 miles)... repeated a couple times on gas and on E85. The engine makes more power and requires less throttle to go the same speed; so the mileage suffers less than you would expect if you listened to people who haven't tried it. LOL

"Ignoramus15242" wrote in message news:CJydne3zE43oIZXVnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@giganews.com...

Reply to
David Courtney

I don't either, but my 4 banger gets 19-20 at 60-65 pulling a 1600lb pop-up trailer. "Aerodynamics of a brick" indeed.

-Brian

Reply to
rtandems

So who is now? They 'all' claim less mileage. Real life also shows this.

You are just talking BS unless you can site 'anyone' that says you get better mileage on alcohol.

Mike

86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00 'New' frame in the works for '08. Some Canadian Bush Trip and Build Photos:
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Reply to
Mike Romain

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