MPG at speed

ruralhipster

After reading the fastest speed thread I was wondering if anyone had ever checked their fuel economy at speed?

Those long deserted streches of highway are tempting to run at speed unfortuneatly those same roads sometimes have the longest stretches between gas stations.

I know that at a steady 70-80 most of us are getting around 35-40 MPG, I was wondering how fast that drops at 120 or even *gasp* 150 MPH.

John01XX

It drops fast or so I have been told

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haWHYnXX

The fact that Warchild has built himself an auxiliary fuel tank for his high speed desert runs should speak towards the effect of MPH on MPG. I'm sure he will chime in shortly with the exact numbers.

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bigXXeasy

while commuting about 30 mi averaging 120mph it drops to upper 20's

hillbilly

120miles equals 4.5 gallons across Ky on my way home from rednexxt last spring. A little longer than an hour to get the low fuel light blinking.

Jason-1999-XX

I cruised at a steady 100mph (indicated) from Jacksonville, FL up 95 north to the georgia state line. Roughly 50 miles and it drank about 2 gallons of the good stuff. Although I don't have fuel-injection, so your numbers for 100mph at 50 miles should be better. Cruising at 100+ for long durations is fairly easy to get away with down here. But only on certain sections of interstate, at preferably early morning hours.

flitemdic

1/4 tank of gas in about 20 minutes at 140-150 indicated.

(Yeah, I'm a squid, but it was the middle of the frikken desert, and I just really, really wanted to get home.)

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N2YN 8/22/2004

mbarr78

If my math is correct that is roughly 30 mpg @ 140-150mph.

Still better than my truck at 60mph.

tomek

I got something like 17 mpg at Road America back in my early stages of trackday riding.There is hardly any part throttle riding at this race track,WOT,brake ,corner,WOT,brake,corne,etc,,

The worst ever on the street was 26 mpg,in pre-PCII era.Power Commander will do wonders to your high speed fuel economy.

BLKBRD

I would guess mid to low 20's on mine...at around 130mph.

flitemdic

Sounds about right. I get about 41-43 normally. Gas mileage is one of the ways I sell the bike to Mrs. Flitemdic, so I keep it pretty well tuned.

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N2YN 8/22/2004

OMG

Havn't much experience with speed
What I do know is that brand has a HUGE impact.
Sinclair = 45-50mpg Conoco = 35-40mpg avg 70mph
Similar findings with my Audi and Toyota tundra

silvertippr2001

THEY DO MAKE THE DIFERENCE

bartonmd

Bullshit. Gas all comes from the same place, in the same trucks... Only difference is a SLIGHT difference in additive packages they put in at the different brands' facilities... that is all.

The difference you're seeing isn't so much a "brand" difference, but more of a MTBE vs. Ethenol additive difference... From the pumps that say "may contain up to 10% ethenol," you will get the mileage difference you're talking about, except not NEARLY as much as you're talking about... When I go from MTBE for a few tanks, to ethenol additive for a few tanks, (commuting, same route, same time of year) I get about 3-4mpg less with the ethenol stuff (~8% difference)... You're talking about a ~25% difference in mileage, and that's just not the case, no matter what gas you're talking about, even if it's in a car that can advance timing for premium unleaded, and you're comparing 93 to 86, you're still only talking about a 10% difference in mileage on the FAR outside...

Mike

BDAZXX

Its not about where the gas comes from, its about how much water they keep in the storage tank to dilute the gas with. Conoco uses more water!

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Warchild

Some of my runs in Nevada and Utah only allow me a range of about 190 miles before the low fuel light starts to glow and I start getting desperate to find fuel.

Um, this is with the aux fuel cell.... carrying 11.5 gallons of fuel...

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bartonmd

I assume you're joking, right?(no emoticon, so can't really tell) Water doesn't dilute gas, because it doesn't mix with gas... If you've got water in your gas, you will know it! Water is also not something that will give you better gas mileage either, when in with fuel, because it will either be the first thing to go through the engine, and that'll be it, or it'll be enough that the engine will not run.

BTW, the moisture in the storage tank thing used to be a bigger deal than it is now, but at least in the midwest (and I think nationally), there were laws passed about the condition of the storage containers, and a bunch of gas stations had to dig up and replace their storage tanks, and they do test for water in the tanks, too, these days. So, as of about 5 years ago, all the storage tanks are basically on the same playing field...

Mike

bartonmd

17mpg... NICE!

BLKBRD

I have to disagree bartonmd, there is a difference between brands...at least around here. I get a few mpg more with BPamoco than with other brands...plus if I accidentally let it evaporate in my lawnmower I don't have to take the carb apart and clean all the gummy residue out. I had an old muscle car with high compression...it pinged bad on all premium fuel except BPamoco.

bartonmd

The mpg and pinging is viable if the Amoco us putting out 93 octane and the others are calling 91 or 92 octane "premium" because this happens quite a bit.

BTW, I used to live where there was an Amoco at the corner, and that's all the gas I put in anything, and before I knew about Sta-Bil, I did have to clean the gum out of the carb in the spring...

Mike

erlingj

110mils per 1 tank of gas is that bad ??????? howe many mpg is that
in europe whe use howe many liters per 100km and i bougt mi bird from the usa texas (ebay) and it has only MPH

tomek

It is common to blend methanol ( or is it ethanol ? ) with gasoline.Those being alcohol will mix with water,so I don`t know, maybe it is possible in this case to blend some water into a gasoline,,,,,,,,,,,,

As a matter of fact during turbo era in F1 Ferrari managed to blend water with gasoline on their motors.( you can run higher boost/compression ratio with water injection on charged motors).

There is ,or at least used to be many diff.blends for diff. U.S. regions (as per EPA regolations),comparing gasoline from let`s say Alabama and L.A. does not make much sense.

iXXion

In Logan, Utah, I filled up, traveled briskly east up the canyon to Bear Lake, then took 30 east to Interstate 80. That's about 135 miles. Once I cleared the lake, I stayed near 165mph except to slow for traffic. I went 16 miles on reserve before I panicked and dropped it back to 45 for the 8 more miles to route 80 and gas. I generally get about 30mpg for the type of riding I was doing in the canyon, so that figures out to just about 20mpg at warp speed. That was with my carbed bike and an 18 tooth front, so the mph was fairly close to real.

Quick estimates with the injected bike show about 24mpg at a steady 125-130. I bet it would drop to 18 or so at 150 plus. The carbed bike got great mileage.

bartonmd

Tomek,

It's ethenol... Ethenol is made from grains, and methenol is made from wood.

I'm not sure how water would blend with ethenol that is blended with petrol. products... I would guess that the standard 5% ethenol (up to 10%, but there's usually about 5% in there) wouldn't hold much water, but I have not seen any studies on it...

I do believe they ran Methenol in those cars, and methenol being alcohal, yes, it will blend with water. Water injection and mixing water with alcohal are completely different... In fact, water injection is still done today, on turbo cars in the after-market. Search "Aqua-mist" if they're still in business, which I assume they are...

You are correct though... comparing mileage as you go across the country and linking it to the brand of gas station has less to do with it than linking it to the region the fuel came from...

MIke

tomek

Well, I know all that about water injection,methonol,etc.

F1 in turbo era did run on "gasoline",except that fuel had very little to do with pump gas,but it is irrelevent.It was mostly toluol ( methyl benzine),like 70 %-90% .

"Classic" water injection was banned,so Ferrari ( AGIP) figured out how to mix water with gasoline,there was no separate water injection system keep in mind.They could run higher compression ratio/higher safe boost,etc.

Plus it was better mixed withn intake charge.

We get up to 10% of ethenol around here.

shovelstrokeed

Funny, I get the same miles/tank at 110+ as I do at -45. The former is lots more fun though.