The topic of gas mileage for this car has been discussed to a point of being more annoying then the gas mileage itself. For anyone who has drivin rotaries before the gas mileage should come as no surprise, especially those that had street ports (which the RX-8 is by the way). The REAL issue here in Canada is the price of Gas!! Yes it's going up everywhere with record barrel of oil prices but has anyone actually compared the gas prices between Canada and the US?! Here are some numbers based on todays country average pricing and exchange rates:

Average Canadian Fuel Price: 92.5 cents/litre
Litres in a Gallon: 3.78
Price per Gallon: $3.50 (Canadian Funds)
Price per Gallon: $2.66 (US Funds)

Average US Fuel Price: $2.35
Gallons in 1 Litre: .264
Price per Litre: 62.0 cents/litre (US Funds)
Price per Litre: 75.7 cents/litre (Canadian Funds)

So who is shafting us? Mazda? no. OPEC? Sorta, but they are shafting everyone so that makes it fair I guess, our Government? Gee, let me think....what was that tax rate on that sticker that the government shoves in our faces when we fill up at Petro Canada?

Enough ranting for one morning.

 

2/3rds for the price of gas in Canada goes to tax....a double tax at that.
Add that to all the other theift by our government...oh but after they fall over adscam, the lambs in Ontario will re-elect them..again!

...my rant is just getting strarted.

 

Easy now...

 

just tired of all my money go to those crooks

 

Keep "rant'n" cause its time it was said. I couldn't have put
it any better.

 

I would bet that "no new taxes" Dulton will get reelected also, he will want another mandate to ensure that no promise has gone unbroken. To improve his odds I have heard he is going to change his name to Ben Dover just prior to the election. Politics in Ontario kind of reminds me of a bad song that keeps playing over and over again in my head, "Do it to me one more time" . . . Just say no lamb and say yes to Alberta beef :-)

 

My question is why is there a about a ¢10 jump between grades of gas by the Gallon in the States and is about the same split here for a litre?

 

Exactly, keeps getting better doesn't it.

 

Looking back 10 years ago, I noticed that the standard of living in Ontario has decreased. People make almost exactly what they made 10 years ago, but gas has doubled in price, houses are more expensive, property taxes and the list goes on and on!


Is it just me whos feeling this??

 

I hear ya. Fortunately its not only Ontario. I think most Canadians have a similar story. Although its true that we have had questionable leaders in this province over the recent past, they're not solely to blame.

I don't know where you live, but once you leave the GTA the cost of living drops off a lot, with the exception of Ottawa which has a moderate cost of living.

There sin't much you can do about it unfortunately, other than speak with your vote if you have any confidence in that process.

Anyway, this is a forum about cars, so I'll end the socio-political banter. :-P

 

I've learned to live with the gas mileage issue. 16 MPG is already good enough for me. Polak explained something last 2003 about the difference between the costs and benefits and such about this topic and that sold me into finally buying the RX-8 on January 2004. Mazda should give something free to Polak for doing the work their Salesmen failed to do :D

 

Ha, my salesman told me: "Oh, and its really good on gas!"

Gas mileage was never really a consideration for me but ummmmm....shouldn't lie about it!

 

Are those litre to gallon conversions done for the US gallon, IIRC the US gallon is different from the rest of the world. I can't remember the numbers and I'm too lazy to look this morning. :D

 

Yes, I specifically chose the US Gallon conversion on the web site I used. :p

 

Well the 7s run fairly rich from the factory, I would imagine the 8s would be similar.

What some 7 owners do is pickup a piggy back air/fuel controller and have the mixture leaned out for better performance as well as MPG. But it would probably void your warranty but then again it is a fairly easy item to remove if there ever was a problem.

 

Well this isn't a mileage thread, but wanted to add an experience to it that concerns mileage, just didn't want to start yet another on the subject.

I've been putting Petro 91 almost all the time since Jan 1st, mileage got better and better until I averaged anywhere from 340-400kms per tank (to yellow warning) depending on my driving. Decided to put Sunoco 91 on my last fillup and it dropped to 310 on that tank, kicker is I hardly pushed it compared to my regular driving, should have got at least 380!

Anyways, this brings a question to mind. It seems anytime you do anything with this car the computer needs to LEARN it in regards to the engine setup. Is it possible that FUEL is another thing it needs to learn? I ask because it doesn't make sense that changing my fuel from Petro to Sunoco should matter if they are both 91 octane but there must be something in each fuel that causes this sudden change in fuel mileage.

I'm not bitching about fuel mileage because it is what it is and I knew it before I bought the car, I'm just curious for the scientific reasoning behind it. Am I the only one that is getting this difference? I put in another tank of Sunoco 91 to see if there will be a change again.

 

That's an interesting one. The ECU doesn't know what kind of fuel is in there, it simply injects fuel proportional to throttle position and likely some adjustments for temperature etc... etc... with a richer or leaner mixture. (or so I think)

I'm theorizing here since that's what I like to do. Say fuel 1 has more calorific value and creates more heat during combustion, is it plausible that the ECU would sense that and make the mixture richer to cool the engine down? This would result in unburned fuel but would help extract the heat from the engine but really hurting your fuel economy.

Like I said, this is a wild guess but I also put Sunoco as there's a station near my place but its 94 octane which is another reason I use it...I get about 310kms before the warning light too. Haven't used other fuel much so I really can't tell if there was a difference with other stuff.

I'm probably out of my gord on the theory as, getting the same mileage (and knowing many others get the same) and not noticing any overheating (from the weee needle anyway), hard to tell. Then again, I don't program fuel mixture algorithms for a living.

Another theory is as you mention, additives. And yes, I realize both of your fuels are 91 octane which should in theory be the same but is one "10% ethanol" and the other not? I know petrocan has some additives that they advertise as helping clean your engine or some such thing but I can't see additives like that help fuel economy...then again, I'm no chemist.

 

I'll let you know....it'll happen!

 

Well I actually stopped using Sunoco 94 in my Audi (now winter car) a couple years ago. They switched to an ethanol blend back then, ethanol acts as a natural octane booster and they cut back on whatever booster they were using previously. The new formula caused serious drivability problems for my car when the engine was cold, yet the previous 94 stuff worked great for years. The car was bogging and stumbling under acceleration when cold but seemed to be okay after warm-up. As soon as I put Esso 91 gas in the problems went away immediately. Ethanol has a lower energy content than gas and if there are performance losses when cold like I experienced, then theoretically your tank might not go as far. I purposely avoid ethanol blended gas of any brand for my cars and in particular for anything that has a small engine as some come with specific "do no use ethanol gas" warnings. I know some tree hugger will be mad at me but if it causes the car to run poorly, emissions probably go up and if it has a lower energy content you will need to burn more of it so the 10% ethanol solution probably generates something like a couple percent in net benefits . . .

 

Mic, I just bought 4 x tires for my Baby...I paid $ 335.00 each, I did lots of reseach on this and this is the best price ever for this tires, also those tires are "la creme de la creme !" of performance tires ....HAHAHA

 

OUPS !! Here is the picture of the tires ...they are beautiful !!! :D

 

Danielson, what brand are those? I like!

Back to the non-mileage thread:

Had to fill up again, I decided to put the same Sunoco 91, I'm already getting better mileage and driving it harder, interesting. I think for the next fillup I'm going to pull nice RPMs all the time for the whole tank...I figure since I've seen the best I can get thus far why not see the worst? I'm targeting sub 200KMs per tank. This might be harder then it seems, I think it could be easier on the track but there are to many cars on the road in my daily drive to push this car good for a whole tank. Only one way to find out I guess.