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Old 11-02-2014, 12:36 AM   #4 (permalink)
niky
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Join Date: Aug 2010
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Yup!

Having previously owned a car with a cammed motor that ran very hot and lean in traffic, the fuel rail temperature sensor was a big bug-bear for me. My tank could vary by two to three liters on every fill, depending on how hot the rail was.

On some newer cars, if you flick the key to the "ON" position and back to "OFF" just once before your second refill, you can just throw those damn results out the window. Which is what the organizers should have done.

But hey... I wasn't running the show. And it's a shame to give a team no score for something that wasn't their fault.

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The fairest thing to do would have been to have the cars filled and parked at the station the night before... then refilled in the morning (after the gas has settled) and sealed. Give the teams no access to the cars before the run. Any adjustments to the tire pressures or anything else should be done after the initial start of the contest.

After the contest, the contestants should be instructed to turn off the cars with the gear selector (on push-button autos) in the Neutral position, so the steering doesn't lock-up. So you don't have to fiddle with the starter while filling.

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And, of course... the route needs to be much longer. Measuring accurate economy on a mere half-gallon to one gallon fill-up is not impossible, but it's very sketchy if you only do it once!
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