Lean Cruise

[Mark S. Riley]

The El Nacional was in the Dec. 1994 issue of Car Craft. Jan. 1996 Car Craft
is the issue for the '95 RSE. Heath Elmer's '87 T Type got 46.17 mph  on the
fuel economy part of the test. We figured the guys from Car Craft got
hoodooed by Heath, no offense to him but being from NASCAR country we are
very familar with the idea that it's not illegal if you don't get caught.
Later that year at Bowling Green, Ky. for the Gran Sport club national meet,
got to talk to Bob Bailey,
the chip guru then associated with now defunct Modern Musclecar from the
Detroit area about this particular gas milage event. Having seen stone stock
GN's knock down 25/27 mpg at 55-75 mph cruise speeds, 46 mpg is pretty far
out of line. Tom Chou of Thrasher Performance stopped at our discussion
group having overheard the subject matter and incredulous comments. He said
that he was responsible for the chip in Heath's car and it was for real. He
also said it took a tremendous amount of time and "tinkering" to get the car
to do that kind of milage in a very narrow speed window. He said that he
originally did this lean burn on his car but that he had found that the
differences between one auto and the next made this type of tuning virtually
impossible for a "one size fits all" senario. Each car had to be tuned
indiviually to the Hiway mode for max benefit and it was just too time
comsuming to do commercially. He did not give up any hints as to exactly
what he did but he is the fellow responsible for the "Thrasher" line of
chips.
    Sorry for the length. I think this is an extremely interesting thread of
information. My 2 pesos worth.
Later, Mark Riley
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bruce Plecan" <nacelp at bright.net>
To: <gmecm at diy-efi.org>
Sent: Saturday, January 13, 2001 5:39 PM
Subject: Re: Lean Cruise>
>
> For the lack of anything better to do I burnt a few different AFR cruise
> chips, just need some decent weather.
> At 14.7:1, I got 25.6 MPG.
> So 16.2 and going leaner might get some relly good mileage.
> Just luv em 12 sec family sedans, that get about 30 MPG
> Bruce
>    Lil guys like it too LOL
>
>
> > Bruce:  I don't remember where but somewhere I read that
> > a guy was running a GN engine in an El Camino and to get
> > fuel economy he was supposedly running 18.0 to 1!?
> > Might be interesting to see what that waste spark ign will light!
> > Mark
>
> > From: "Bruce Plecan" nacelp at bright.net
> > > I'd thought 16.2 would be about the limit, but alias wrong again.
> > > I'm to that, and motor is happy as a lark. (ie real happy)
> > > With a low CR engine already running a bunch of timing.
> > > What are folks running for lean cruise ratios?.
> > > Bruce


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