146 replies to this topic

[MacGyver]

SDM & others. R u guys "blipping" the eco or r u letting it cycle between the EV & recharge ICD modes automatically?

 

Macgyver = 65 mph up hill is tough to swallow personally, given my last experience climbing the Sherwin grade which is a long a$$ haul up, north of Bishop,CA  really KILLED my drive MPG numbers by a lot vs 2 bar uphill and holding the acceleration there. Anyone else can back up and repeat Macgyver's finding?

 

I know, I'm considering changing my forum handle to "Captain Counterintuitive"- all I can say is that's what Torque is telling me as far as instant MPG, just like how 65mph is more efficient than 55, 70-73mph is the highest gearing (miles per piston bang) and thus the most efficient speed.

 

I'll try "2 bar accel" vs. 70-73mph to see which is more efficient, but I can't help thinking that load is not going to be as important as the final gearing and work accomplished (distance traveled) in relation to how much gas spent,

 

This convo has given me an idea; I'm going to activate a "fuel used" or "gas flow rate" on Torque to see what gas consumption is at 50% load, 75% etc, vs RPMs, speed, etc.

 

How steep is sherwin grade? Never mind, googled it; Old Sherwin climbs about 3,500' and has a few somewhat steep sections (up to 10%). another result says 6%, which I would say is a bit more than uphill to tujunga. Any grade like that is at least gonna cut MPG in half, for me, I just try to figure out what the most efficient speed is to miniimize that grade's impact on average MPG.

 

In other counterintuitive news, I finally had the air shield on the bottom of the car removed before a trip to vegas, (because it was partially causing an annoying vibration in the floorboard under my feet, which is still present though to a lesser degree due to the lightweight construction of the C-max I guess) and MPG seems to be the same or slightly improved.

 

See the mythbusters testing of "tailgate up or down for maximum MPG" for a more detailed explanation of why, but quickly; the air pocket/bubble created by the bottom of the car is as or more slippery than the air shield.

 

needs more testing, (wife drove part of the way, ruining mpg by driving like a maniac as if every second of vegas time were precious or maybe they're going to close vegas or something, so vegas trip average is not to be trusted as accurate,) but I've seen my average increase, and have not noticed a drop in MPG, though I have noticed less vibration.

Edited by MacGyver, 19 December 2013 - 09:34 PM.

[Jus-A-CMax]

Tujunga is nothing compared to Sherwin. The 14 between Sand Canyon and Acton is more slope than Tujunga also but I only hit that on the way out to Mammoth usually. Yeah, even my wifey KILLS my MPG as well.

 

Thanks Macgyver...not trying to give u a hard time, its jus me....

 

 

"Blip" question is still open to SDM and others...

 

ps if u want a name change, we can do that too...lol...

Edited by Jus-A-CMax, 19 December 2013 - 08:45 PM.

[MacGyver]

Tujunga is nothing compared to Sherwin. The 14 between Sand Canyon and Acton is more slope than Tujunga also but I only hit that on the way out to Mammoth usually. Yeah, even my wifey KILLS my MPG as well.

 

Thanks Macgyver...not trying to give u a hard time, its jus me....

 

 

"Blip" question is still open to SDM and others...

 

ps if u want a name change, we can do that too...lol...

 

I didn't take it that way, one of the crucial values of this forum is to ask pertinent questions others might not have thought of in our search for knowledge and truth.

 

I think I'll stick with Macgyver, just wanted to point out I realize how crazy some of the stuff I'm saying sounds and wouldn't say it without a reason...

 

I'm pretty good at keeping my ego out of our discussions, I'm still not perfect but I'd say I'm about the last person you need to worry about hurting their feelings by saying I might be wrong about my approach to hypermiling- I've honestly approached the question and tried to keep my ego out of it even while I'm happy to be on the cutting edge of discovering the C-max's performance envelope.

 

On the question of premium vs. regular gas, I'm on the side of regular, though I keep an open mind, the atkinson engine might work differently, though it would take some doing to convince me that a basically incorrect (premium) fuel mixture would perform better than regular, given that it would be starved for oxygen to efficiently combust.

 

And as far as my contention that 70-73mph is the most efficient gearing, I'd abandon it in a heartbeat if it were shown to be wrong. I've already revised it from my original observation of 75mph once I realized that in Torque, I have readouts for both GPS and OBD speeds, and they mostly agree with each other, (about 0.1 to 0.5mph variance) while hovering about 2-3mph slower than the cars speedo. Or the car might be right and those are wrong. And the Torque instant MPG reading might be completely wrong, or off 5-10% or whatever.

 

So when I mention my wife destroying the average, that's not equivocating or making excuses, it's data, that tells the reader just how to weight the report that MPG seems to be unaffected and possibly improved by removal of the air shield.

 

So have no apprehension about "disagreeing" with me, I don't see it that way, to me, it's a lively discussion and what I came here for.

 

Plus the fact that you're getting better average MPG than mine- (mine hovers around 40-41 high of 43 recently, yours is what, 46 or more? Plus, my route is always changing, and sometimes I drive like a maniac too, sometimes you have to in L.A. since no one will let you change lanes if you put your blinker on) hard to argue with numbers, you're doing something right... we're all just trying to work together to figure out how to get the best MPG we can!

Edited by MacGyver, 19 December 2013 - 10:18 PM.

[Jus-A-CMax]

You're good Macgyver, glad you're pumping this info to share with the rest of us, much appreciated. I'll put it to the test when I do my runs. Theres 3 of us on this forum whos roughly in the same area: GaryM, you and me. Beauty about that is that we say this XXX freeway, or Conejo grade, we know exactly how that road goes....except Sherwin grade

Edited by Jus-A-CMax, 19 December 2013 - 11:33 PM.

[ptjones]

For my testing I used a 14.4mi Fwy test loop so I could control the variables as much as possible when testing. It was the only way to get credible results.
Paul

[ScubaDadMiami]

SDM & others. R u guys "blipping" the eco or r u letting it cycle between the EV & recharge ICD modes automatically?

I just use Eco Cruise Control without blipping.  Too much work for long highway runs.

[MacGyver]

More data; I'll be having the bottom airshield reinstalled on my C-max thursday, it seems to have shaved some efficiency off the top end- 65-73mph now yields no more than 40mpg.

 

I would see some spikes to 45, even 47mpg, but not the 50-60 that I got before.

 

Wanted to alert everyone asap not to repeat my experiment, or at least have the dealership retain their airshield for possible reinstallation... sorry for any inconvenience!

 

The vibration I was also trying to eliminate is still present, thought to a lesser extent, so it makes sense to have the better mpg and seek another solution for that, maybe have some thicker steel welded to the bottom of the drivers floorboard....