Quote:
Originally Posted by moTthediesel
Yeah, you're probably right --
The fuel pump operates strictly in liquid fuel, and even in the fuel/vapor zone, where our proposed "full indicator" would be working, the fuel vapor/air mix would likely not be potentially explosive. Still, it just doesn't give me a warm feeling!
For me - I'd still like to go with "cork on a stick" technology  |
Eh, I was just funnin' with ya. Frankly, I don't blame you at all. On my tractors, I prefer the fuel level doo-hickey that comes as part of the fuel tank cap. It's basically a cork (plastic) on a twisted stick (calibrated, even) that as the fuel level rises, turns the stick, which turns the needle in the cap. You can see your fuel level clearly, and no wiring necessary.
This probably wouldn't work for a vehicle, though.
I think for consistency in filling, the best, and probably one of the only ways, is just making sure that the fills are done the same way. Not that all the cars are filled the same way, but making sure that each car's before and after fill are as close to precision within each other as can be done reasonably.
For our particular purposes in the GGP, I don't .01 of a gallon is terribly important, but as you can see from the above calculations with the Sentra, .1 gallon can really make or break a competition like this. (30MPG difference in readings)
Really, the only other way I can think of, which involves more time and considerably more expense for the participants and organizers of the GGP, would be to weigh each vehicle pre and post. A scale sensitive enough to notice ounces would most likely be sufficient, but that's quite the scale for something as large as a car, where the "norm" is 10# increments in displays.
While the site glass method works, this, again, involves much more time to fill each car, since it would require that each filling tech meter fuel, then check, correct level, check again, correct level, etc.
Of course, we don't want the competition getting outside the realm of reality, either. We can't really have each competitor custom fitting a competition fuel tank to their vehicle to be removed and weighed before/after each run, can we?