Date:         Sun, 14 May 2006 17:25:05 -0700
Reply-To:     Loren Busch <starwagen@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Loren Busch <starwagen@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Gas Milage Mystery (Or Not)
Comments: To: Wet Westies <Wetwesties@yahoogroups.com>,
          vwvan <VWVANFULLTIMERS@yahoogroups.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=WINDOWS-1252; format=flowed

I'll toss this out to the lists for information and discussion.  I just
returned from a 3,000 mile, 27 day excursion from the Seattle area to
Hollister and back.  I'm driving a '90 Westy.  I was traveling with another
Westy, an '87.  Both running stock 2.1L WBX, both automatics.  The '87 is
running 16" wheels, I'm running stock 14" alloys and 185R14 Agilis 61's.  When
we ran ourselves over a weigh station, I was about 300 lbs heavier than the
'87 (I'm a pack rat) and in addition I'm running with a Bagawest carrier,
sticks up better than a foot above the luggage rack.  The '87 is carrying
'stuff' in the luggage rack, tied down.  When these two vehicles ran
together for about 10 days last fall, the '87 frequently used from a tenth
to a half a gallon less gas than my '90 at fill ups. (didn't have the
Bagawest at that time).  On this trip, after getting an injector problem
fixed a couple of days into the tip, my '90 consistently used from a tenth
to half a gallon LESS than the '87!  And this was not flat out highway
driving, it was a lot of up and down, twisty stuff, Highway 101/1 along the
Oregon and California coast, out and back.  I had had a set of rebuilt
injectors installed just before the trip.  One went bad in about 100 miles
and was replaced with a used injector.

I'll let the list speculate on why the difference between the two vehicles
performance, and also speculate (or just take note) that the performance of
the two was so close.

Waiting for comments……