How Can I test Fuel Efficiency On a Lawn Mower?
Hello,
I am doing a High School Science Fair Project for school and i need a way to test it! My project just test the fuel efficiency on a lawn mower engine strapped to a DIY Go-Kart (built myself)! I Cant think of any way to test this. That is why I am relying on the world to help me out. Thank you all!
That was very helpfull! Are there any other ways?
There are several ways to do this, here is one way I know of.
Fill your gas tank, be very careful to remember precisely how full it is. Make a mark on it or something. Then drive the car for some distance, lets say 10 miles. Then see how much gas you used.
Whatever amount of gas it takes to refill the tank to its original level is exactly how much gas you used.
You will then be able to say my car gets X miles per gallon of gas.
For scientific experiments you should repeat the process a few times and record the results for each run, repeatability is important for such experiments.
Things to keep in mind: The faster you drive, the lower your efficiency will be due to aerodynamic drag. If you perform the experiment on different days, differences in temperature and atmospheric pressure will affect the density of the fuel and skew the results a bit. Also fuel in the system between the tank and the combustion chamber can do funny things with air bubbles and such and may not always be constant. For high school science fair projects these may be negligible, but you may want to at least mention that you understand these factors do exist.
Good luck
