Mythbusters: Is a bike greener than a car? - Page 8 - Fuel Economy, Hypermiling, EcoModding News and Forum

cRiPpLe_rOoStEr · 08-15-2013, 12:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fidalgoman

I have his CD where he stated that a typical motorcycle only needed 125 - 250 CC's and about 18 HP to be practical. Now think if you gave it 30 HP and a high efficiency engine on a truly streamlined shell what it would do on the street.

More than 50% of all the brand-new motorcycles sold in my country are in the 125 to 150cc displacement range, with a little less than 18hp, and they actually fair pretty decently.

sendler · 08-15-2013, 06:42 AM

[QUOTE=IamIan;385205]75 MPG to 80MPG is the norm QUOTE]

As shown on the computer? Scan gauge? Or tank fill? The onboard computer reads high compared to my tank fills. No fuel log posted anywhere?

euromodder · 08-15-2013, 10:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sendler

More motorcycles that are lane splitting save car drivers time too.
.
Why commuting by motorcycle is good for everyone - Telegraph
.

What TML conveniently left out is what it'd do to the death toll on Belgian roads.

Belgium already has roughly twice the road deaths as the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, the UK.
We're falling like rock on the EU ranking - mostly because the southern and eastern EU states are getting much safer far quicker than we're improving ...

Anyways, 15% of the Belgian road deaths, are motorcyclists ...
Yet they do but a fraction of the mileage of cars.

Getting 10% of the commuters out of their cars and onto bikes would roughly mean doubling the number of bikes out there, while increasing the driven mileage significantly.

And thus more or less double the biker's death toll ...

fidalgoman · 08-15-2013, 12:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

More than 50% of all the brand-new motorcycles sold in my country are in the 125 to 150cc displacement range, with a little less than 18hp, and they actually fair pretty decently.

Exactly! I chose 30 HP (perhaps too high) for a bit of passing performance at speed. What I have found about motorcycles is they are about max power for light weight rather than ultimate efficiency. What if these bikes had engines designed around high MPG rather than a by-product of their small engine size and low HP?

I remember a while back a Ford Engineer who made a streamlined reverse trike that looked like an airplane fuselage and got high MPG. Just saying we have the technology and it could be tweaked up quite a bit.

cRiPpLe_rOoStEr · 08-15-2013, 01:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fidalgoman

I remember a while back a Ford Engineer who made a streamlined reverse trike that looked like an airplane fuselage and got high MPG. Just saying we have the technology and it could be tweaked up quite a bit.

I don't remember this one specifically, but in early 80s Ford presented a prototype reverse-trike with a Ghia body featuring tandem-seating for 2, an aircraft-like canopy, and a single-cylinder 200cc Vespa engine, which was called Ford Ghia Cockpit.

sendler · 08-15-2013, 03:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by euromodder

Anyways, 15% of the Belgian road deaths, are motorcyclists ...
Yet they do but a fraction of the mileage of cars.

What do you think needs to change?

IamIan · 08-15-2013, 05:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sendler

Quote:

Originally Posted by IamIan

75 MPG to 80MPG is the norm

As shown on the computer? Scan gauge? Or tank fill? The onboard computer reads high compared to my tank fills. No fuel log posted anywhere?

Dash.

I have no doubt there is some variation ... No measurement is 100%.

Even within the dash +/- range ... I still do not think the Gen-1 Insight has to be going "pretty slow" in order to achieve average of ~70 MPG ... because I can and do that or better within +/- 5 MPH of the posted speed limit ... which I think +/- 5 MPH from the posted speed limit is not considered "pretty slow".

- - - - - - - -

In short ... I don't think any form of measurement is 100% ... they all have their +/- minus range ... be it the dash or the pump.

There are issues ... often ignored ... with using pump given gallon numbers ... the pump is not 100% accurate either ... no matter how many digits they show you ... that is not the number of digits of accuracy that pump is obligated or celebrated to ... legally many states let them pass and get a department of weights and measures sticker as long as they are within +/- 2% ... ie it reads 10 gallons but you might have actually got 10.2 gallons or 9.8 gallons ... and they would pass just fine ... which I think +/- 2% is fair ... and what happens to the pump that is 10% off ... when it gets tested again it gets a fine ... that's it ... how big of a fine does it have to be compared to the 10% or so more profits they got from a miss counting pump ... no notices ever go out ... no refunds ... etc.

So unless you are using a higher than 2% precision measuring device / system ... that ~2% +/- is all the precision I would give the average gas pump to be good for ... also even if the pump was 100% perfect ( and it never is ) gasoline evaporates , changes density with temperature / pressure , etc ... what I pump in today , might not actually be the number of gallons in it tomorrow ... nor used while driving ... even if it has not been driven at all , and none has been used from one day to the next.

- - - - - - - -

As for fuel log ... It is not about bragging rights for me ... I have no intention of participating in that ... not my thing ... YMMV ... if you want to discuss the pros and cons ... how things work ... that's fine with me ... but if it's just about mines bigger than yours ... I'm not interested ... And I would be just as not interested even if I had 10x the MPG ... I don't care for that... which is why I am loathe to even post my current numbers ... it's a slippery slope into a mines bigger than yours type thing I have negative interest in.

But ... I'll cross my fingers and hope your request doesn't turn into that

Although I am loathe to go down this slippery slope....
My Dash Current tank is 78.7MPG for 372.3 Miles ... driving my commute and such within +/- 5 MPH from the posted speed limit.
Running average of this tank and the two previous tanks ( including times when my wife drove ) 76.3 MPG for 1,428.5 Miles

And mines not magic ... there are others who also get ~70 or so MPG on their commutes without going 'pretty slow'.

Context / details matter Allot ... YMMV ... I've known people who averaged as low as 19 MPG in their Gen-1 Insights ... and others up around 90 MPG ... it varies with a wide variety of details ... some of it is driving slower ... but not all of it is just driving a slow average speed.