HarleyTechTalk

Hoss, I ride out west a bunch, fuel stops can be 50 miles apart. You skip one, you might not make it to the next. When I had a five gallon tank I was always out of fuel and looking. The six gallon helped relive that stress some, another gallon would be nice. I remember running 150 miles on interstate in Montana, against the wind. Pulled in for gas and put in 4.9 gallons in a 5'er. The previous possible gas stop was 40 miles back.

My bladder? Lets just say my bladder has been compared to a camel. I can run a full tank and longer without a pee stop. I have run 265 miles at 60 MPH on a six gallon tank and wasn't in any hurry to pee.

You're a lucky man, not having to pee every hundred miles!

Quote from: PoorUB on March 16, 2019, 07:00:23 AM
Hoss, I ride out west a bunch, fuel stops can be 50 miles apart. You skip one, you might not make it to the next. When I had a five gallon tank I was always out of fuel and looking. The six gallon helped relive that stress some, another gallon would be nice. I remember running 150 miles on interstate in Montana, against the wind. Pulled in for gas and put in 4.9 gallons in a 5'er. The previous possible gas stop was 40 miles back.

Was the gas gauge showing a faster rate of use, or did it suddenly drop and catch you off guard?

Quote from: Hossamania on March 16, 2019, 07:36:54 AM

Quote from: PoorUB on March 16, 2019, 07:00:23 AM
Hoss, I ride out west a bunch, fuel stops can be 50 miles apart. You skip one, you might not make it to the next. When I had a five gallon tank I was always out of fuel and looking. The six gallon helped relive that stress some, another gallon would be nice. I remember running 150 miles on interstate in Montana, against the wind. Pulled in for gas and put in 4.9 gallons in a 5'er. The previous possible gas stop was 40 miles back.

Was the gas gauge showing a faster rate of use, or did it suddenly drop and catch you off guard?

The gas gauge, at least in my opinion, drops pretty fast after 1/2 tank. Pretty sure the gauge has no compensation for the shape of the tank so with the back bone there is probably 1/3rd tank when the gauge says 1/2.

I was watching miles remaining, at it showed we were ok but a fair margin, but I forget if the wind picked up, but it seemed the closer we got to the next stop, the lower the safety margin was.

Even with the six gallon tank I have been surprised! Gonenorth and I just had both bikes tuned and went on a trip. 150 miles on interstate and we were out of fuel at 150 miles. I know we both were surprised that we got something like 28 MPG that stretch. Funny thing was we both had brought our TTS tuning dongles and were recording data, but had never discussed it. At the gas stop we re-flashed the ECM's with a slightly altered tune and went on our way. Next stop we got something like 32 MPH, another re-flash, run to the next stop, re-flash and so on. By the time we got back from the trip our MPG had come up to around 37-38 MPH on the interstate. Quite a change, additional 50-60 miles of range.

We will run 150-175 miles on the interstate, 200+ on back roads. With the wives with, it might be to the next second hand shop.

Most OEM senders are custom printed and trimmed for that gas tank only. The trim tolerances are really close (<0.1 Ohm) and the unit can be "damaged" by fuel contaminates. Of course also physical damage can happen to the element or float and arm. Sulfur really plays havoc with the real low Ohm resistive paints used for these. Most of these sender elements are on Alumina substrates and really quite expensive as automotive parts go at the OEM level. We keep thinking they will switch to something cheaper! I'm satisfied with the Ultra's gauge on this bike but like other older riders still set the trip odometer at every fill and still wish the injected bikes had a reserve.
Just saying,
R Meyer