Official Thread for posting daily FE updates

[omgwtfbyobbq]

OIC!

[Peakster]

The weather has been warming up to around the freezing mark (I ran out of windshield washer fluid today) and my MPG has been getting better too. 1.0 GPH was required to stay at 50mph when it was super cold out, but today I drove in the high 40 mph range using only 0.7 GPH. So far, my overall tank according to the SG reads 54.8 mpg.

[usedgeo]

The disconnected idle speed control looks like it may have helped. I had 43.0 for the first leg of my morning commute and I did no EOC. This is one of my better numbers for this segment without EOC The engine idles at least 300 rpm's slower than it did before. When the engine is stone cold, I do have to feather the pedal a bit but within 1/4-1/2 mile it will idle without dying. If this becomes too big of a problem I may have to look into hooking up a switch for cold starts.[/QUOTE]

My cold start experience was almost identical to yours. I let it idle slow just to see what would happen and it died and set a code. I think it was just for missing but I didn't read the code carefully before I cleared it. I made it to work at 47 mpg. My best ever. I was on the freeway going a little over 60. A big truck got in my way and I couldn't pass up the draft. . Coming home I made an extra stop so just managed 63 mpg. The homeward bound is on secondary roads with mostly 40 mph limit.

Darn, I am driving like my brother that I used to make fun of.

I have to get serious about some fender skirts and things like that now.

Ernie

[95_corolla]

what is the idle speed control, what does it do, how do you disconnect and by disconnecting it what will the car do differently than it was doing prior.

thanks,

[usedgeo]

Originally Posted by 95_corolla

what is the idle speed control, what does it do, how do you disconnect and by disconnecting it what will the car do differently than it was doing prior.

thanks,

The idle speed control is an electric motor that regulates an airflow past the throttle to control idle speed. Think of it as a much smaller throttle.
Our saturns go into High idle when we EOC, actually I think it is everytime the engine is stopped. When we restart after the coast the engine can go up to over 2500 RPM and does not come back down right away. By unplugging the idle speed control wire we can eliminate the racing engine after an EOC. It saves a spot of gas and is much less annoying.

Ernie

[95_corolla]

so is it kind of like when an older car that uses a carborator starts up the RPMs are higher untell it warms up. Is that what the idle speed control is doing when you first start the car and If you were just EOC the car would not need that little extra gas or RPMs because it was just running.

[skewbe]

Originally Posted by 95_corolla

so is it kind of like when an older car that uses a carborator starts up the RPMs are higher untell it warms up. Is that what the idle speed control is doing when you first start the car and If you were just EOC the car would not need that little extra gas or RPMs because it was just running.

The saturns (and possibly others) do annoying things with the idle speed well beyond warmup.

In my case, in my automatic, it idles very high in neutral if the car is rolling, and it revs up the engine right after a start, even though it is warm.

[jwxr7]

I had a new best FE today. 444.5 miles on 7.896 gallons = 56.29 mpg. That's in the dead of winter weather! I'm not trying to say that all of the gain is from my grill block, but that is the only difference from the last couple tanks. Same weather, same driving.

[DRW]

Re: idle control.
On my car the idle speed controller also raises idle when the car is moving. Idle is also raised when there is load on the power steering, A/C on, cold engine, when starting and maybe more.
I've also seen a section of code for the auto tranny that raises idle when the car is in gear vs neutral. It's an odd bit of code since the engine will idle lower when in gear, but use more air/fuel due to the load of the TC.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by jwxr7

I had a new best FE today. 444.5 miles on 7.896 gallons = 56.29 mpg. Same weather, same driving.

Nice work! At this rate, you're going to turn in some astonishing numbers when the nice weather returns.

I forget: have you posted details of your commute? What kind of terrain/speeds? Techniques?

EDIT: I see from your gaslog that you aim for 55 mph max. How long is your commute?

I'm betting with numbers like that, you're not doing too many short trips.