V-8 powered Seabee

On 04 Nov 2003 05:48 PM, clare @ snyder.on .ca posted the following:

I know my 3.8 injected and electronically controlled 6 in my current
vehicle gives significantly better than a 30% improvement in mileage
over the 3.8 liter carbureted engine with mechanical timing advance on
my '75 Pacer did - and the van has a larger frontal area, weighs
several hundredweight more, and has air conditioning and an automatic
transmission. It is also capable of significantly higher cruising
speed, and accelerates MUCH more quickly - and the 232 inch AMC was
much more sophisticated in the control department than an old Franklin
or Lycosaur.

My 1973 Chevrolet pickup truck with a carbureted 350 V-8 and automatic
transmission gets between 10 and 11 mpg, city, highway, loaded, unloaded,
uphill, downhill, tailwind, headwind, whatever. A newer Chevrolet with
the same engine and fuel injection can be expected to get around 20 mpg
on the highway. Part of that is due to the better transmissions that
are used today, but mostly due to the efficiency of EFI. In addition,
modern fuel injection offers advantages in cold starting (my '94 S-10
would start instantly at 40 below zero with no preheat, though it was
normally kept plugged in when it was below zero), and operation at
extreme angles which would give a float carburetor fits (more of an
issue offroading in my Jeep). I LOVE fuel injection. But I am not
ready to fly behind an automotive based EFI system, not yet anyway.

A little over a year ago, my less than 2 year old Jeep (which uses a
descendant of your 232) coasted to a halt at mile 87 on the Parks
Highway between Fairbanks and Anchorage. The cause was a seizure of the
mechanical drive which operates the camshaft position sensor, a hall
effect module which supplies engine speed information to the computer
for the fuel injection. This single point failure instantly shut down
the fuel injection system and required around a 150 mile tow to
Anchorage, which luckily was covered under the vehicle's warranty (
particularly when you consider that I had been in the middle of Yukon,
Canada two days previously).

I would consider using an EFI with redundant sensors for required
computer inputs, but until such a beast is available, I'll have to pass.

----------------------------------------------------
Del Rawlins-
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