DMCox's Forum Comments
Showing all comments by DMCox.
Reserve Miles for Motorcycles
Just a note of caution about reserves - had a guy I used to ride with years ago that always liked to ride until the engine sputtered - meaning he had run out of fuel. He'd then switch over to reserve and start looking for a gas station. One day he did this, and the engine continued to die. He had no reserve and was out of gas. Turns out that on his old BMW, the "normal" position of the switch caused the gas to be pulled from a small pipe that stuck up about a half inch above the bottom of the tank, and when you switched to reserve, you drew that last half inch or so of fuel. His was an older bike, and the little pipe had fatigued and broken off, so he was drawing from the bottom of the tank all the time. Now, I think that most modern bikes use some sort of electronic sensor these days, but I always wonder if that system might fail, so I keep an eye on my miles since last fillup. The few times I have run all the way down to the point where my reserve light comes on, I've found it to be completely accurate (1.1 gallons remaining - I once had it turn on about 500 feet from the gas station)
posted by DMCox September 7, 2008 at 6:05 PM
Partial fuel-up Issue
I read the FAQ (thanks for the quick reply, but don't understand why the next fillup isn't counted. As I see it, the calculation is fairly simple:
last fillup, miles1, gallons1 - mpg calculated
partial fill, miles2, gallons2 - no mpg
fillup, miles3, gallons 3 - you can now calculate mpg by (miles3-miles1)/(gallons2+gallons3)
I tried one of your competitor's sites and at the time they didn't have a partial fillup option, so I just did this manually and it worked just fine. I've done this for years in a paper log I keep in my glove box - I just mark fills and not fills, and when it is time to calculate mpg, I just add all the interim partials to get the total gallons used between fills.
posted by DMCox September 3, 2008 at 5:28 PM
pb - maybe this is why I'm not getting mpg calculated after my last fillup - it was only 4.0 gallons. Since my entire tank only holds 6.1 gallons, I've never put much more than 5 gallons in, and usually a fillup for me is in the 4 to 4.5 gallon range. Do you have some way of turning off this "feature" for motorcycles?
posted by DMCox September 3, 2008 at 2:18 PM
Need way to indicate a missed fuel-up entry exists
mrmerlot - you can accomplish this by doing the math yourself. Say, I put 1 gallon in to get me to that cheaper station, where I now fill up with 10 gallons - just put down a fillup with 11 gallons. I would agree that having an option to record partial fills would be better, but until they provide it for us, you can just do it yourself.
posted by DMCox August 13, 2008 at 12:43 PM
Support for motorbikes
Solved the problem (sort of) - entered my Goldwing as a Civic - hey, the manufacturer is at least correct taht way, but it means the comparison to similar models stuff won't work for me. I put the Delorean in as a Ferrari Enzo - if I've got to call it something else, why not call it something cool? ;)
posted by DMCox August 11, 2008 at 5:05 PM
ditto on the motorcycles, although you might also want to allow cars that are not in your list. Currently I have 2 vehicles I'd like to add to my garage that I can't: a '00 Honda GL1500 (motorcycle) and a '83 Delorean DMC-12 (not a motorcycle)
posted by DMCox August 11, 2008 at 11:27 AM