Flow Sensor - To measure fuel used?

Parry
Posts: 7
Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2011 5:37 am

Flow Sensor - To measure fuel used?

Postby Parry » Fri Nov 30, 2012 2:22 am

Has anybody successfully used a flow sensor to measure fuel used. I always empty my tank inbetween heats and would like the Dash to display fuel used after I reset the number.

Or even a equation to show number of laps left with the average fuel consumption calculation.

Can anybody share their experiance?

Regards,
Parry

osborni
Posts: 497
Joined: Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:08 pm
Location: USA, Michigan

Postby osborni » Fri Nov 30, 2012 2:35 am

Unless your fuel system dead heads on the injector rail, you won't be able to measure actual consumption.

Most folks use a tank level sensor to measure fule level directly.
BMW 2000 M Coupe

Parry
Posts: 7
Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2011 5:37 am

Postby Parry » Fri Nov 30, 2012 3:33 am

Yep, you are right, what flows through the sensor won't mean it is all consumed.

Will have to find another way to measure, without a fuel level sensor.

Support

Support

Postby Support » Fri Nov 30, 2012 11:02 am

This is possible using the DL1 mk3/pro with any DASH or DL1 mk2 with DASH4.

You will need to use 2 fuel flow sensor one in one out. Set the DL1 to do pulse counting and in the DL1 mk3/pro case apply a equation in the variable mapping to take one from the other.

You may need to calibrate the fuel flow sensors to get high accuracy, but once calibration is done you would get good results.

RT (K)

WillM
Posts: 84
Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 11:00 pm

Postby WillM » Fri Nov 30, 2012 3:31 pm

I've often wondered if two fuel flow sensors could accurately measure fuel consumption as described above, but wondered about pressure. Do the sensors compensate for pressure? Do they need to?

How about recording injector pulse width and applying an equation instead? Do you have an ECU, and can you interface it with your DL-1?

Parry
Posts: 7
Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2011 5:37 am

Postby Parry » Sat Dec 01, 2012 10:38 am

WillM wrote:I've often wondered if two fuel flow sensors could accurately measure fuel consumption as described above, but wondered about pressure. Do the sensors compensate for pressure? Do they need to?

How about recording injector pulse width and applying an equation instead? Do you have an ECU, and can you interface it with your DL-1?


Unfortunately I cannot interface with the ECU, I think I will stick to a fuel level sensor. I find them very unreliable on the track. I do endurance races thus fuel measurements are important. I would love to see average consumption over the last 5 laps and determine how many laps I have left before I need to pit.

Support

Postby Support » Mon Dec 03, 2012 1:24 pm

Hello,

This is something that will be available on the DASH2 pro

http://www.race-technology.com/wiki/ind ... figuration

Under car computer functions.

RT

osborni
Posts: 497
Joined: Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:08 pm
Location: USA, Michigan

Postby osborni » Mon Dec 03, 2012 2:44 pm

Parry wrote:
WillM wrote:I've often wondered if two fuel flow sensors could accurately measure fuel consumption as described above, but wondered about pressure. Do the sensors compensate for pressure? Do they need to?

How about recording injector pulse width and applying an equation instead? Do you have an ECU, and can you interface it with your DL-1?


Unfortunately I cannot interface with the ECU, I think I will stick to a fuel level sensor. I find them very unreliable on the track. I do endurance races thus fuel measurements are important. I would love to see average consumption over the last 5 laps and determine how many laps I have left before I need to pit.
You should be able to get a baseline for consumption per lap during practice (?).
BMW 2000 M Coupe

Support

Support

Postby Support » Mon Dec 03, 2012 4:06 pm

Regarding pressure effecting quantity of fuel in flow sensors. The volume of liquid doesn't change under pressure. If you increase the pressure more fuel gets squirted out the injector and the flow increases.

Kind regards,
K

Parry
Posts: 7
Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2011 5:37 am

Postby Parry » Mon Dec 03, 2012 8:41 pm

osborni wrote:
Parry wrote:
WillM wrote:I've often wondered if two fuel flow sensors could accurately measure fuel consumption as described above, but wondered about pressure. Do the sensors compensate for pressure? Do they need to?

How about recording injector pulse width and applying an equation instead? Do you have an ECU, and can you interface it with your DL-1?


Unfortunately I cannot interface with the ECU, I think I will stick to a fuel level sensor. I find them very unreliable on the track. I do endurance races thus fuel measurements are important. I would love to see average consumption over the last 5 laps and determine how many laps I have left before I need to pit.
You should be able to get a baseline for consumption per lap during practice (?).


This is the way we do it now, but this does not give us real time cunsumption. The practice environment could be differnt to a race environment with weather changes and strategy considerations. We might want to reduce consumption to extend a stint to ensure we hit our fuel pit window to ensure we finish the race etc.

Parry
Posts: 7
Joined: Sat Jan 22, 2011 5:37 am

Postby Parry » Mon Dec 03, 2012 8:45 pm

Support wrote:Hello,

This is something that will be available on the DASH2 pro

http://www.race-technology.com/wiki/ind ... figuration

Under car computer functions.

RT


Vey nice setup GUI! From reading the specs, I can see we should be able to rear the ECU for fuel consumption if it is available, which is great as most of modern cars have this function. Bit if your running an aftermarket ECU then we will still need to determine how to set it up to be measured. I will search on how car computers calculate fuel usage see if there are any hints there to replicate aftermarket. Good discussion.

osborni
Posts: 497
Joined: Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:08 pm
Location: USA, Michigan

Postby osborni » Tue Dec 04, 2012 4:46 pm

Don't aftermarket ECUs output injector duty cycle?
BMW 2000 M Coupe


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