Question: "Portability" of SGII?

[MechEngVT]

I've read that lots of folks have specific settings and calibrations for the SGII that I assume are to improve the accuracy of the reported average fuel economy as compared to the hand-calculated miles per fill up/gallons per fill.

How long does gathering this information take in miles or number of tanks? Is continuous calibration necessary or do the settings stay pretty constant? How accurate would the gauge be if you were to not calibrate it to the pump?

I am interested in the SGII to help my wife get better mileage in her Odyssey, but I also hope to have our Subaru back on the road this winter and we would probably drive it more at that time so I would move it over. How long would it take to "set it up" on a different vehicle? Specifically, could I have it set up on one vehicle, and move it to another one quickly for a road trip?

Thanks in advance!

[Daox]

Once you get the initial calibration (1-2 tanks gets you pretty close) down its fairly accurate unless you do EOC. Also, once you have the initial calibration down you just write down the setup and put it on another vehicle. If you want to put it back in the original vehicle, you just punch in the settings you wrote down.

It also depends on how you use the scangauge. If you want to have accurate tank readings you need to have it on the car for the whole tank. If you take it off to do a road trip in another vehicle, you are going to mess up the data it has already collected for the current tank.

[azraelswrd]

Originally Posted by MechEngVT

I've read that lots of folks have specific settings and calibrations for the SGII that I assume are to improve the accuracy of the reported average fuel economy as compared to the hand-calculated miles per fill up/gallons per fill.

How long does gathering this information take in miles or number of tanks? Is continuous calibration necessary or do the settings stay pretty constant? How accurate would the gauge be if you were to not calibrate it to the pump?

I am interested in the SGII to help my wife get better mileage in her Odyssey, but I also hope to have our Subaru back on the road this winter and we would probably drive it more at that time so I would move it over. How long would it take to "set it up" on a different vehicle? Specifically, could I have it set up on one vehicle, and move it to another one quickly for a road trip?

Thanks in advance!

After 2 tanks (at least 3/4 per tank), the SG was good to go for me. 3rd tank confirmed the adjustments made in 2nd tank. Without calibration and adjustments, my avg MPG readings were TOTALLY wrong (ie. Avg MPG per tank, Avg MPG per current trip). I thought I was getting 45 mpg on a tank but it was closer to 41 mpg. I'm all good now.

You can use the SG between different cars as quickly as you can unplug it, stick it into new car and enter data for it. Just write down the info for the old car (tank size, engine size, fuel type, cutoff value, speed adjustment, fillup adjustment) so when you put the SG back into that car you get everything as it was before. Takes about.... 2 min to input the system data? Longer if you don't know the specs on your car.

Ideally, you might want to get a few tanks in both cars so you can get the tank adjustments out of the way so that when winter comes, you can just plug in and enter in all the data you already collected.

[instarx]

Hmmm, sounds like an A/B switch on the Scan Gauge III would be a nice addition.

[RH77]

I hook it up to rental cars almost every week and it seems to remain fairly steady on FE results.

RH77

[Ford Man]

After the first tank calibration on mine is usually within 1/2 MPG. As others have said it is a simple set up that takes less than 5 minutes if you know the specs of your car. Great little device for FE and also is capable of several other useful bits of information.

[rocket]

I EOC 1/5 - 1/4 of my drive to work/home (lots of hills in SE CT). How would i be able to use SGII??

[Ford Man]

Originally Posted by rocket

I EOC 1/5 - 1/4 of my drive to work/home (lots of hills in SE CT). How would i be able to use SGII??

It will help you find the best FE operating conditions for your particular car and will also help you change your driving habits by being able to see in real time what kind of effect different driving habits have on FE. It also has lots of other useful information besides just FE and can be used to scan your ECU for codes if you have a check engine light on. No more paying a garage $50-$100 to do this for you.

[Brian03cav]

i was wondering about this too, as mine is comming today and everyone i tell about it wants to try it out haha. but i plan on calibrating for my car first.