Green Grand Prix 2012 Watkins Glen, NY USA

[sendler]

http://www.greengrandprix.com/
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138.5 miles / 1.026 gallonsUS = 135.0 mpgUS
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on my CBR250R during the Green Grand Prix on the track at Watkins Glen, NY USA. 45mph average speed, 90% tuck laying on a tank bag, three hour event. I used full on Pulse And Glide and Engine Off Coasting. Probably posted the best actual fueleconomy of all the vehicles competing but won't get credit for it as the vehicles without built in computers were required to calculate the fuel usage by the total weight lost using scales. This was totally inaccurate. I did my own tank fill in town before and after to get the real numbers.
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97.2 miles / .988 gallons US = 98.8 mpgUS
Home and back between days at Watkins Glen.
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89.5 miles / .88 gallons = 101.7 mpgUS
Over the road rally at Watkins Glen. Pouring rain and 45F. With observed fill ups. The guy in the Heinkel whipped us all with 124 mpg His "good" home made bullet vehicle blew the engine last week so we were spared from seeing him hit 160.
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The event was very well organized for the 38 cars, and one bike, that were on the track and had a sea of volunteers including professional flag men and ladies who called you up to start on a dime with strict precision and waved you off, and home, with a flurry of green, white and checkered flags! Very cool. Full spotters with radio headsets. They black flagged team Lexus as the car did several laps drafting the SUV at about 10 feet. I wish they had seen the jerk in the white Insight that tried to block me from passing up the hill out of turn 2. I was already even with his driver's window when he pushed me to within 6 inches of the curb. When the horn didn't work I should have knocked on the glass to ask him to calm his road rage. Lucky for him he was on my throttle side and I didn't fee like letting go as it is a very steep hill. The Insights were the cars to stay away from as they would sometimes use heavy braking into turn 1 to regen their batteries. It was a little crowded at times but I generally had a great run. Turn 1 is no joke as you dive down 50? feet through the tight right angle. I was just shy of dragging a knee. It was one of the turns that had a speed limit of 40 and was actually pretty extreme if you mis calculated your entry speed as the team of Michigan college students did when they spun it at 50! Luckily there was no roll over and they were able to continue their run after getting it pointed the right way again. It was a beautiful day Friday. Saturday, not so much. Too bad my blue tooth audio drained my battery or I would have had more photos to share.
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Saturday dawned overcast and cool but the rain held off for my hour commute back the the Glen for the 6:15AM mandatory observed fill up. So I was able to stay dry while we hung around the paddock for the drivers meeting before heading out for the road rally. A front moved in just as we were starting. The temps dropped into the low 40's F and a heavy mist started blowing sideways out of the West. Visibility was 100 feet at best. Not the nicest day for a 3 hour motorcycle ride. Or car ride as one guy found out when he rolled his driver's window down at a check point and it jumped off the track. By the time I got to the half way point at the top of the lake, It had changed to pouring rain. Motorcycle(s) were allowed to run a simplified route according to a map rather than using the TSD rally turn by turn instructions so I wasn't under the gun to hit any exact times. My hands were pretty cold by the 3/4 point so I went in to McDonalds to grab a burger and hot drink. This worked out well as I was the 3rd vehicle in at the end for our refill. It was really fun to hang around to watch all the other cars check in. The driver of the ultra cool factoryfive kit car liked my over boots. His pants and shoes were soaked to the knee as the car picked up an inch of water on the floor through it's leaky doors. The professional photographer shot 100's (thousand?) of photos so I hope most of this gets posted somewhere.
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I made the mistake of mentioning when I checked in at the track that most of the competitors were here to contest their fuel economy and would probably rather not have to run a puzzling TSD rally. The team of SCCA racing enthusiasts laboriously grading and pointing the check in sheets jumped all over me and told me to go find another event. Sorry! I won't mention it again. Unfortunately, there are very few other fuel economy events anywhere and it seems that SCCA sanctioning is the only way to get this done. Maybe I will join the SCCA to try to enlighten them about hypermiling as a new form of competition. It really is a cool sport and harkens back to the days of endurance racing in the 60's where the only rules were to pass a safety inspection and you might have big block V8's running against turbo 4's or high revving V12's. Hypermiling is the new "run what you brung" competition.

[choneofakind]

Very cool event! Sounds like you had fun.

Admittedly, I still am of the opinion that engine off coasting is cheating because it's simply racking up miles that have nothing to do with the fuel efficiency of the engine. It's a soap box derby car at that point.

Originally Posted by sendler

Probably posted the best actual fueleconomy of all the vehicles competing but won't get credit for it as the vehicles without built in computers were required to calculate the fuel usage by the total weight lost using scales. This was totally inaccurate. I did my own tank fill in town before and after to get the real numbers.

It is?? Pardon my ignorance here, but what else would affect the weight? Weigh the vehicle cold before the event, and then weigh it once it cools after the event. Gas is the only thing being used during the event correct? ...unless people cheat and wash their windows a ton while they're driving around the course.

How is doing your own tank fill more accurate? You don't know the accuracy of the meter on the gas pump; sure they're all certified by the state to be fair in their measurements, but that doesn't mean that the gas station manager didn't mess with his pumps, or that the pump you used isn't faulty. You know there is going to be some error in the mileage given to you by your odometer.

I'm just interested that's all

[sendler]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

what else would affect the weight? How is doing your own tank fill more accurate? You don't know the accuracy of the meter on the gas pump; sure they're all certified by the state to be fair in their measurements, but that doesn't mean that the gas station manager didn't mess with his pumps, or that the pump you used isn't faulty. You know there is going to be some error in the mileage given to you by your odometer.
I'm just interested that's all

The scales only read out to the whole pound and weren't accurate enough at all. Some of the cars showed over 200 mpg from the weight used even though the owners did their own tank fills and measured it at 80. One guy refused to get off the scales until he made sure everyone knew of his disapproval when they weighed him at 13 pounds which was 66 mpg. He did his own observed tank fill afterwards to show that he had really gotten 84. Some of the guys are former X-Prize competitors and brought their own fuel and graduated cylinders and were using fill to the brim fuel cells which are very repeatable as is my bike.
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The nice thing about filling a motorcycle is that you are looking right at the fuel. I sit on the bike holding it level and fill until the fuel just washes over the fill plate. I was being especially careful today and took note that each bump of the pump at the end is only about .003 gallons. I'm sure my error is less than .01 gallons which would be less than 2% in a worst case, overfill-underfill situation.
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My odo is verified dead on after correcting the +1 front sprocket with a 12 O'Clock Labs Speedo DRD speedo healer.
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You are fooling yourself if you think these modern electronic gas pumps are more than a fraction of a percent off.
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[choneofakind]

Interesting. I didn't know that they only used a scale that was accurate to the pound. That seems pretty unfair.

I thought speedo healers fixed the speedometer reading at the expense of the odometer? I honestly know very little about this subject which is why I'm interested.

I'm not fooling myself, I just don't trust gas stations/companies in general because gas is so darn expensive and it wouldn't surprise me one bit for them to be dishonest in their pumps' precision.

[sendler]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

I thought speedo healers fixed the speedometer reading at the expense of the odometer?

You can heal the error of the speedo or odo, either one. I made my odo dead on. My US CBR250R read 1.4% short initially. The opposite of most bikes which are usually 2-8% optimistic. Then I added 7.1% (theoretically) with a +1 tooth front sprocket. On the road at 65 mph, the correction is closer at + 8.6% with the healer. Now I am within a few hundredths % of accurate mileage. The US speedos are very close to the same as the odo. The rest of world CBR250R's have a +8% speedo error but the odo's are accurate so you would have to choose which one to give emphasis to.
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My tach reads about 4% high according to the actual values in the Honda scan tool but that doesn't bother me when my engine is off while coasting. I did this only on the track to really see what number I could hit as it is not good for the transmission.

[choneofakind]

Cool! Kinda jealous of the accurate speedo/odo.

Although, that 8ish% hopeful speedo on the ninjette keeps me honest at times

[sendler]

Some photos have been posted here.
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http://ecomodder.com/forum/302937-post97.html
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[greenaero]

Sendler, Congratulations on a great performance! Too bad about the measuring protocols. I'll be competing in the Vetter Carmel Challenge this week so we'll see how things go.
best wishes, GA