Fuel Economy is Too Good ...

[Rusty54]

Originally Posted by petehoovie

If you're addicted to and can afford this hobby, it would seem that 'fuel economy' is not a priority....

It can be a fun game to play with yourself on a long trip though.
On a road trip to Queensland from Victoria here in Australia for the 2012 Early Ford V8 Nationals in Caboolture, we had my parents '35 Ford 4 door and a '54 Ford Crestline Skyliner travel 1075 miles over 3 long days to get there. Same to get back a week later.
That's a pretty good distance to get some real figures with and I kept a log book for fuel and distance for each car.
The '35 has a standard rear axle and 3 speed manual with a slightly more modern '39 Mercury engine, rebuilt to standard specifications with the addition of some original aluminium heads. It has been converted to 12 volt electrics and runs a single 97 carb on the original manifold.
The '54 we bought out of the Utah mountains as a (sort of) restored car a few years back, and while we were told it had a new overdrive behind the 3 speed, it wasn't hooked up right and when it was wired properly it made some horrible noises....
So for all intents and purposes it was a fair match between the two cars with one sporting a flathead and the other its original 239 OHV.
The Skyliner has 4.09 diff gears and I believe the 35 runs a similar ratio, slightly taller.

So, after 2150 miles in each car during a week and a half run, with varying terrain and weather conditions, both cars doing the same speed at all times, it was quite surprising that they both returned an average near enough the same. Both of them hovering around the 17.5 mpg average.......
It should be said that the 239 OHV was consistently pipping the flathead by a couple of points between fuel stations, but that is to be expected.

And we still haven't had that overdrive unit out to have it looked at......too many projects