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Filled my first tank... wanted to throw out some thoughts on it.
After my first fill, I was still unsure what lean burn really was. I mean, I got the concept, but didn't know how to implement it. I didn't even know when the car was doing it! After putting in an x-gauge into the SGII, I was starting to really see it in action and got a much better feel of it. After that, it's been about learning to get it into lean burn... and keeping it there! Especially for highway.
The start of this tank was also a mess of maintenance and pre-aero upgrades. Having to bleed the cooling system definitely took a hit on my MPG this tank, but it was necessary and worth it... after all, the heater plug ended up going in at the same time! Plenty of panels under the front and rear that were missing parts, beat up, unglued, whatever. They got fixed and I feel better about it.
Another strike against my tank was training my wife on a manual trans. It took several days of go-stop in 1st. Definitely didn't help, but I want her to be able to drive this car. After all, it was our "we need a 3rd car" excuse to buy it! lol
The few aero upgrades I've done at this point (primarily about a ~60% lower grill block, passenger mirror removal, and wipers-b-gone) seems to have helped a little. Tire pressure on these Contental's or whatever they are (some 185/60r24 tire that isn't the RE92's) seems critical in the feel of rolling. 45-50 psi wasn't enough, these wanted 55-60psi! I also have 1 tire with a slow leak, so I have to check that one once a week at least.
I also installed a 12v charger and grid charge the 144v system when it gets low. I intentionally try to keep the system from being charged by the car. No sense in using petrol when I can use the far more efficient 110v system provided by Idaho Power (BTW, electricity is very low cost in this area). I've heard that it's bad to grid charge all the time, but I try to monitor closely and not do a full balancing charge when I do it, so there's that hope. Just gotta last until Linsight is go.
All that said, I started this tank with a struggling 57mpg average. Over the coarse of the tank, between mods and learning the car, I was seeing my daily trips get as high as 102mpg! My last few highway runs were 84mpg average (with a 50 or so MPH average). This tank turned out to be a 71.64mpg tank with about ~40% highway and ~60% city. I can't complain a single bit. I have plenty more in store for this car before the cool winds of fall hits and am excited to see the future for it.
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