[mwebb]

i suggested that cars of equal mass were to be compared
a 1600 lb crx with a carb does not compare to a 2500 lb citation or k car with TBi -
when comparing cars of equal mass the system with fuel injection AND engine management wins a contest of fuel economy -

early CIS systems without engine management were only marginally better than carbs , but still , they were measurably better .

carbs are poor 2nd place even with engine management ... such as it was .

Originally Posted by itjstagame

While I agree this is true for american made cars there are exceptions and the 70s is a bad time frame to pick because of the gas crisis there were a LOT of very FE cars in the 70s. Additionally carbs and TBI were not that different FE wise in the 80s, we really only saw improvements with injectors and tuning improvements heading in to the 90s. Carbs actually vaporize fuel and I believe overall required less maintenance, injectors are just cheaper and easier to tune now.




I know this is the 80s, but I think it's worth noting this is 52MPG from a carb while GM was busy throwing a TBI on everything and still getting worse FE.

Anyway I agree with you overall, just wanted to point out that carbs could be quite amazing and while cars produce less pollution per unit of exhaust volume, I do not believe overall we're getting that much less pollution per mile.

Actually if you want to really go back you should look at when they first removed lead from fuel, only in the past 15-20 years have we really reclaimed that lost HP and FE from having to severally lower our compression ratios and tune for a cat that wouldn't really be necessary with the correctly build engine or tune.