[ShadeTreeMech]

Well, I just logged a roughly 1200 mile journey from Arkansas to Iowa and back again. It was interesting as we had little to no sleep and did it all within 24 hours. I never slept so good in my life when I got home!

On the way up, we encountered some rain which seemed to sap some of the mileage, as well as having to make several more pit stops than normal due to 2 children refusing to sleep. All in all though it was an interesting experience.

I am sold on using 89 octane though. Nissan recommends 91 octane, but it can run 87, so I split the difference. After a couple tanks of 89 which did well, a tank of 87 that didn't do so well, and a tank of e85 which made my idling issues worse but gave me a decent MPG figure, 89 is certainly a winner in my book.

For whatever reason, 89 octane is cheaper than 87 in Iowa, by about 30 cents a gallon. I haven't a clue as to why, but I know the tank of 89 I got in Iowa gave me 30 mpg. I'm not too pumped about it though, I fear faulty data. During most of that tank I was running at 80 mph, but it was flat and we didn't stop but one time. I know my brother and I were in shock watching the tripometer moving along quite quickly and the gas guage seeming to get stuck for about 100 miles. Turns out the guage is quite accurate in predicting half a tank, and I know when I hit empty I still have about 3 gallons left. My biggest refuel was 15 gallons, but i have a 18.5 gallon tank.

Doing the math, I calculate that with straight through driving I could easily exceed 500 miles on a tank. As much as I wanted to have some aeromods on for this trip, I figured a good baseline would be in order.

My Scanguage seemed to read the correct speed from the computer more or less. If anything it was 1 mph fast according to my brother's GPS unit. My speedo is also nearly 4 mph fast, but then again, the computer reads more or less correctly. I have a sneaking suspicion I am about 1% fast on the odometer, so I wonder if I could get tires that are 1% bigger around? I counted mileposts and watched the tripometer, and after about 5 miles the tripometer was getting a hair faster. I could worry about it more, but i suppose it falls in the realm of reasonable error.

What really confuses me is that 30 mpg tank. I know for a fact we were doing most everything wrong, ie driving fast, using the cruise control, and passing quite a few people. But we didn't stop hardly at all, rarely had to slow down, and drafted trucks whenever possible. And on the downhills we encouraged the fuel shut off @ 0 TPS. I suppose I need to try to repeat the experiment.

My brother showed more interest in the SG than i thought he would, since he's not the car bore i tend to be. My wife is also watching it too, which helped her get a 27 mpg tank in mainly city driving. Here's to hoping it pays for itself sooner than later!