Calculating gas mileage is not just dividing the gas volume by the number of miles traveled. There are a number of variables that affect a vehicle's gas mileage. If you do want to calculate the mileage of your car or truck, you will need precise equipment to carry that out and also remember to keep the following variables under consideration:
Road conditions are very important considerations. If you are driving on good roads freeways or highways you will get a better mileage than you would on a bad road full of potholes and craters. If you are planning to calculate the mileage of your vehicle then the best bet is testing it on flat roads to get the optimum value.
Being "stuck" in the traffic and keeping an eye on your odometer will probably not give you a fair estimate on your mileage either. Idling consumes a lot of gas that otherwise you won't incur. Starting your car and then breaking frequently also effects mileage adversely. Again try testing your vehicle in a long stretch of road. Dynamometer is used by scientists to measure miles per gallon at different speeds. Gas consumption at 55 mph and at 75 mph varies drastically.
Drastic weather changes also influence the mileage. Laminar adhesion is an important concept to understand in order to determine a car's vehicle. Generally extreme fog, rain, snow and wind affect the laminar adhesion and thereby influence the amount of energy the engine spends to move the vehicle. The car gets more resistance in moving against air. If it is raining heavily consider up to 10% reduction in mileage whereas a 1%-2% change in mileage is expected for a decrease of every ten degrees in outside temperature.
Using the pump auto stop will not give you the exact volume of gas in your vehicle. In most cases vehicles take in as much as three gallons of gas after the auto stop has indicated a full tank. This auto stop varies in gas stations. Filling up your gas tank to the fullest is never a great idea either because often overflow costs in loss of gas. You can check your mileage by filling your empty tank up to 10 gallons and then drive around. Ideally you should repeat that a couple of times to calibrate the results.
Last but not the least and the most important factor to consider while calculating mileage is the engine condition. For example if you have just tuned your engine and you want to test the mileage after installing the latest gas-saving equipment, then probably you won't get accurate results as a better mileage can be attributed to the freshly tuned engine.
So as we can see there are a number of factors and variables to keep in to consideration while calculating the mileage of a car or if you are planning to test the performance of a newly launched gas-saving device. Keeping all the variables at an optimum level is your best bet.
Author Resource:-
Gregg Hall is an author living on the Emerald Coast of Florida. Now that you know a little more about gas mileage be sure that you get gas saving products by going to http://www.nsearch.com
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