Gas Mileage

Bomberos' Tricks

Expat13 said:

__ way to steal-meaning the mix of gas that is used and its concentration. I dont know if this is the case...

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This is just one of their tricks.
Others:
- Pumps that cheat on the quantity or price shown.
- Pump not set to 0000 when pumping starts (so you pay for somebody else's fuel)


donP

Expat13 said:

I hear from some, that the gas stations here have found another way to steal-meaning the mix of gas that is used and its concentration. I dont know if this is the case...

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How can you dilute gas and not have your car run poorly?

I find the condition here to be brutal on cars. The traffic, miles of bumper-to-bumper. Hills. Air (dirtiest air filters I have ever seen, I don't even get 5000 miles from one. Finally went oil-charged K&N's on all our vehicles but bikes). Roads (VERY high rolling resistance and a LOT of dirt.) Even the autopista can't be really considered normal "highway" driving.

My X-Terra 4WD gets 14mpg here on premium gasoline. My friend with the exact same model gets 17mpg in FL.

Another factor you'll notice: the DR eats brakes, suspensions and tires alive...

I was told the aircon uses quite a lot of gas ,

Cheating Pumps

Expat13 said:

Are they able to tamper with pump readings??

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I am certain they can.
There were many reports about cheating LPG pumps recently, so I guess petrol pumps cannot considered to be safe either.
Whatever can be calibrated, can be de-calibrated.... :cheeky:

donP

1. tampered gauges on the pumps
2. low quality fuel(it may say premium or sin plomo, but how do you know? How do you know you re buying 92 octane? How do you know that the 87 octane is not really 82?)
3. low quality components(tires, motor oil, coil).
4. underinflated tires, misfire condition, faulty plugs, exhaust restriction, ECM or TCM errors, cooling system problems, etc.

Expat13 said:

Cobraboy i hear what you say about conditions, which is why your avergaes are worse than your florida friend. Mine is 12.5mpg compared to 26 it should be getting.

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It's not the gas.

You have other internal problems.

RacerX said:

1. tampered gauges on the pumps
2. low quality fuel(it may say premium or sin plomo, but how do you know? How do you know you re buying 92 octane? How do you know that the 87 octane is not really 82?)
3. low quality components(tires, motor oil).
4. underinflated tires.

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None of those would make a car get 50% of the mileage it should.

And you'd know if you had low octane. You'd be pinging with preignition and hotspots like crazy and burn a hole in a piston...or 3.

And the OP was complaining about miles ~per tank~, not miles per gallon. A full tank is a full tank no matter what the pump reads.

cobraboy said:

None of those would make a car get 50% of the mileage it should.

And you'd know if you had low octane. You'd be pinging with preignition and hotspots like crazy and burn a hole in a piston...or 3.

And the OP was complaining about miles ~per tank~, not miles per gallon. A full tank is a full tank no matter what the pump reads.

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Not necessarily so. New cars(all ECM controlled MPFI, especially those with VVT) detune if the octane is too low, the ECM would or can retard the timing as much as -17 degrees to prevent detonation and pre-ignition. Additionally if there is lead in the fuel(regular-con plomo) it can melt the baffles in the converter(if so equipped) causing a restriction and/or foul the O2 sensors(creating a run rich condition, if so equipped). All these factors can compromise mileage. IN addition to if there any faulty sensors(ECT, O2, MAF, IAT, or ISC) than can lower mileage also by sending bad signals to the computer.
I thought he was saying he was getting 240km/tank vs 500km/tank? I m saying that he may be putting 20 gallons in the tank at the bombero but it may not be the fuel he though he was paying for. Even the fuel gauge may be off or not reading properly.

I toured the refidonsa refinery and lab and the production there is similar to others in the world. There are standards they have to abide by. At the time shell was running the refinery which is not the case now. Of course you cannot rule out dilution after delivery or the truck making a stop to remove and dilute but I would think that would be found out and published. The gasoline not produced in Haina is imported as gasoline by the distributer so any checks would be done by the distributer.

I would suggest you try different gasoline brands and see if you get the same results. Shell was produced in Haina and probably still is, the others are mostly imported.

Here is my story with fuel:

I have a 2005 Toyota 4Runner. The gas mileage in the US was about 18.5 MPG in the city.
Since I moved here I never got better than 16 MPG, not even on the highway (if you can call this a highway).
About 2 months ago the MPG dropped significantly to 13 MPG. I changed gas stations ( I prefer Shell), but to no avail. I thought the car might have bad O2 sensors or a bad MAF sensor, so I run a complete diagnostic test on it. Everything passed OK. I checked out several Texaco and Shell stations here in Santiago, all with the same crap results.
One day I had to go to Sosua and I filled up my car at the Texaco there. With their premium fuel I had a 18+ GPM again - never happened in the DR before. Since than I had an other trip there - same results.
I wonder if the North Coast has a different supplier for fuel. I was going to try a Shell in Puerto Plata also, but I didn't have to go there lately.
Back in Santiago I'm still having the same bad MPG. A client of ours suggested to try the Texaco near the McDonalds and Nacional supermarket, but the results where the same.
Since this whole saga started, I had several clients who stopped by and asked for diagnostics because of the same problem, all but one passed all tests so IT IS THE FUEL!
Higher octane not necessary means higher energy! Octane can be boosted with additives on low energy fuels so there will be no pinging, but you still can have low performance, therefore bad GPM.

BTW, I still look for good quality fuel in Santiago! Let me know if you know any.

Well, my conditions are:

Approximately normal gas mileage on highway, but very poor gas mileage in city driving.

For example on LPG, I get about 40% in city driving (bumper to bumper, frequent stops and idling) compared to highway driving (base 100%). I get 50-60% of the base reference with less frequent stops and more traffic flow (still city driving). Highway, as I say, is OK, per the book on both gasoline and LPG.

It's more or less same ratio for city driving consumption on gasoline as it is on LPG.

I don't know whether it's the external conditions (traffic) or there's something wrong with the engine/transmission running in the first/second speed.

I had transmission and engine tested via the code reader and nothing pops up.
There are no cooling issues. I run AC on the second, recycled air, and if it is at noon /very hot then it's on the third speed.

Any ideas?

rubio_higuey said:

Well, my conditions are:

Approximately normal gas mileage on highway, but very poor gas mileage in city driving.

For example on LPG, I get about 40% in city driving (bumper to bumper, frequent stops and idling) compared to highway driving (base 100%). I get 50-60% of the base reference with less frequent stops and more traffic flow (still city driving). Highway, as I say, is OK, per the book on both gasoline and LPG.

It's more or less same ratio for city driving consumption on gasoline as it is on LPG.

I don't know whether it's the external conditions (traffic) or there's something wrong with the engine/transmission running in the first/second speed.

I had transmission and engine tested via the code reader and nothing pops up.
There are no cooling issues. I run AC on the second, recycled air, and if it is at noon /very hot then it's on the third speed.

Any ideas?

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What kind of car do you drive? year / model / engine / mileage?
You need to make sure there is no vacuum leak after the mass air flow sensor, no disconnected vacuum lines, cracked intake hose. The ECM will adjust to those conditions by keeping the injectors open longer and - unless it reaches the fuel trim limits - won't set any trouble codes. That means it will push out the short term fuel trims - using more fuel.
If you have a smart tech he will know what to look for on a diag. computer to see this, unless he is using a POS code reader, like most DR tech.
Let me know the car's specs and I'll think see.

The Hun

soooo does the air conditioner use any petrol/gas or just battery power -sorry Im not technical on cars

jrhartley said:

soooo does the air conditioner use any petrol/gas or just battery power -sorry Im not technical on cars

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Compressor uses gas, blower uses electric, battery if the engine isn't running...but if the engine isn't running the compressor won't make the air get cold...

ah ........so the more you blow the more gas you use

I just counted, my propane equipped Montero V6, 3.6L gives me 15mpg on highway. When i drive on gasoline, its 13-14mpg. Its strange, as propane must give less miles. I guess the quality of gasoline here is so bad! The car drives so smoothly on propane and is much quieter.

Is impossible to compare the gas in the US with the one we buy in DR, I used to do auto mechanic works for many years when in Dr and some time when my hands were to greasy I used to wash it using gas but the first time I did it here in America I saw the devil, that thing burned my skin.
The Dominican gas is porqueria compared with the American one.