Saga BLM/FL & 1st batch SV with AichiKikai manual transmission FC related matters
This post is specifically dedicated to AichiKikai transmission variant, other manual transmission users are welcome to practice/use my method, but you may need to vary your parameter in order to match your transmission gear ratio, in order to obtain optimum fuel efficiency.

First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to apologize on my recent lack of participation regarding technical knowledge support on GaGa tered. Reason being, I was diversified exploring more on Plotong Shawie, also quite fedup of question being asked repeatedly. As and when I tried to answer, all I got was skeptical, unbelievable, or sometimes even insult kinda reply. Anyway, let's put all those behind and I would also like to congratulate those manual transmission owner that's being holding up with your horrible ever sohigh rpm on normal highway cruising achipokai gebox! I know it aint easy to NOT curse the car, trust me I felt exactly the same each and everytime when I'm travelling back to my home town.

I've been having many buttaching months with my every sohigh fuel consumption BLM ever since I bought the car. I've done many things trying to improve the fuel consumption, only to find out it's getting worst. At times, when I'm really sticking to the rules, doing everything which is foul to be practical in daily driving, just to get 15km/l for that 1 tank petrol. Ask me again, is it fun? The answer is - NO! 1 wouldn't like to turn the engine off when waiting at traffic light, during the waiting period is very warm, and when the lights about to turn green, as you turn the key to start the car, people will look at you 1 kind. The worst I've tried was at MEX, when reaching the hill top, I turn off my ignition and turn it back to ON, declutch at 5th gear and let the car free roll just to get 1~2km free roll. So, below is the list of unconventional way to save fuel, and the bad side of practicing them:

Fuel saving technique that is common but not quite practical

1. Switch off engine on traffic light - If you don't know each time crank start your engine is like smoking a cigarette, can shorten your engine lifespan. It may not affect it now, but sure do in the future.
2. Declutch downhill roll - Without engine braking, crosswind can sweep your car away, can drift, can fly, or even slam to the truck next to your car.
3. Switch off engine downhill roll - Without engine brake, not even the basic vacuum brake assistance, you need to rely much on your foot strength to stop the car in any emergency event
4. Switch off aircond and whirl down the window when driving - Aircond compressor indeed eat up torque, but if you switch the thermostat to minimal, the compressor usage will be limited to few seconds in a minute. Driving with windows down, airflow is disturbed. Air being channeled into the cabin will be blocked by your rear windshield, hence create drag. If you use sophisticated software to calculate, the coefficient drag with windows down is not that significant compare to driving with windows up, and yes it truly is, but it's also the same with driving with all the windows up, with minimal setting on the thermostat.
5. Change gear before 2krpm - This is NOT always the case. Changing gear prematurely will only result in lossing speed, and you'll have to press more on the accelerator in order to gain speed on higher gears.
6. Pump extra air pressure on tire - Believe that extra air will make the wheel slimmer, so can reduce friction to achieve better fuel efficiency? Don't forget when your wheel get extra pressure, the width reduce but the height increased. So, your engine RPM need extra torque to spin a greater diameter tyres.
7. Nitrogen filled tyres - It does helps to maintain pressure due to retarded gas being used, less air leak. It somewhat helps in terms of FC if the tyre pressure is being monitored and at optimum operating pressure, but you wouldn't know how pure the nitrogen was filled.
8. Install after market vacuum module(eg air charger/air booster/adjustable charger with gauge) - All these are vacuum leaker. These over rated equipment are solely depending on marketing strategy to cheat/con on innocent vehicle owner. The're not other than a 3 way release valve, which you can purchase from aquatic pet shops. By installing this valve to allow more air leak into the engine, it helps to cheat the ECU to release more pressure on the fuel regulator, you'll feel more power. Simply because you didn't know when vacuum leak, that means your throttle is already being pressed without you noticing it. See the resemblance of how things works below:
   
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   If those something charger really works, let me teach you 1 best/simple/many fold more powerful than those crap that you purchased in the market with the same amount of investment.
   
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9. Justify fuel efficiency with your digital fuel gauge - Come on, my 1st bar can last 70km. lhwj 1st car can last up to 120km. My Shawie can last up to maximum 50km only on the 1st bar. Does it mean my Shawie FC worst? No it's not. Usually when people saw their 1st bar lost at 50km, the rest of the tank will be very bad FC because their right foot never bother to save fuel anymore since they think this tank already screwed up for FC run.
10. Fuel treatment, some call it octane TABLET - If it's in liquid form, yes I believe it. But when you're talking about a solid object... I doubt. Octane itself is to increase the stability of air/fuel mixture(retard flash point). The high octane goes into your STOCK engine, the harder it gets burn enough to convert into energy, the more fuel being burnt and convert into black smoke and you get less power to travel further. How is that supposed to save fuel?
    
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    QUOTE

    2,2,4-Trimethylpentane, also known as isooctane or iso-octane, is an organic compound with the formula (CH3)3CCH2CH(CH3)2. It is one of several isomers of octane (C8H18). This particular isomer is the standard 100 point on the octane rating scale (the zero point is n-heptane). It is an important component of gasoline, frequently used in relatively large proportions to increase the knock resistance of the fuel.
    
    Strictly speaking, if the standard meaning of ‘iso’ is followed, the name isooctane should be reserved for the isomer 2-methylheptane. However, 2,2,4-trimethylpentane is by far the most important isomer of octane and so, historically, it has ended up with this name.
    Read Wikipedia
    
    
    If you still feels to choose a bottle and test it, make sure you go through the ingrediants, Can find a list of material being used to decrease knocks. Please refer Wiki
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiknock_agent

So, we're been talking about things that NOT practical, what is practical and useful then? Below is a list of commonly known fuel saving techniques being widely used and found practical and effective.
Fuel saving technique that is common and practical for all kinds of petrol car

1. Anticipate traffic ahead can avoid braking unnecessarily - Picking up speed burnt a lot more fuel than cruising. So, avoid braking is 1 good thing
2. Gradual acceleration instead of sudden acceleration - Usually it's not how fast you shift up to save fuel. It's how efficiently 1 put their right foot down the gas pedal. Later part of this discussion, I will include vacuum meter reading for easier understanding what is an optimum gas pedal position.
3. Get rid of threadless tyres - Usually tayar botak consume more fuel because the contact area of the tyre surface create more friction with the ground, than tyres with thread.
4. Down size your rim and tyres - Smaller diameter, easier torque distribution, less load to engine, less fuel consumption
5. Check on tyre pressure every week(if you don't fuel up in a week, then do it the everytime you fuel up) - Make sure you're at the sweetspot of comfort and efficiency. Usually pressure set at 210lb or 30PSi is suffice. If you're a lazy moron, can do up to 260lb or 35PSi. The problem is, when 260lb that time, the car felt extremely bumpy and fuel economy is harder to attain the same efficiency as 210lb.
6. Register a fuelly account and record on every fuel up - So you can monitor your average fuel consumption. When you have that, your right foot will automatically have more discipline
7. Always fill up full tank - Often heard people like to put RM30 and fuel up like every other day. Going in/out of the petrol station will take up fuel also. Unless you do like my father, turn off engine and let the car roll into the station, follow by a leg breaking braking to make the car stop.
8. Make use of point collection reward
   Petron - 3000pts = RM45petrol
   RM1 = 1pt(none expiry)
   Shell bonus link - 3000pts = RM30petrol
   RM15 = 8pt
   Petronas - Unknown, havent claim before
9. Remove spoiler - Down force = more weight to the car = higher fuel consumption
10. Good set of tinting film = Less heat absorb from direct sun light, aircond more efficient, thermostat can go lower, less torque consumption from compressor = ultimately fuel saving

Just 1 last thing, do you know if your aircond gas was overfilled, your cooling power is less efficient and thermostat will have to trigger even longer for the refrigerant to cool down itself instead of cooling down your cabin. The heat exchange hose will be over pressured, your cooling coil will be less efficient due to slow refrigerant traffic. It takes a very skillful magician to tune your cooling system, cold engine bay/hot engine bay and cold engine bay tuning repeatedly to get the best pressure. Here's a video of wellknown MH370 pilot Capt.Zaharie teach you how to tune your aircond system.


To be continue...

This post has been edited by davidke20: Apr 19 2014, 06:29 PM

Talk about historyl
This chapter, I'm going to share with you some findings between myself and a few GaGa BLM owners, in how to drive efficiently to achieve the best fuel efficiency. Here I would like to highlight 2 of the major contributor to my fuel save theory is coolkwc and lhwj. 1 of them is my real life buddy, we meet each others in Penang for TT, another 1 I've never met before, but we had great conversation over discussion forums. They're both equally important to me in learning how to use an electronic fuel injection car that operate with drive by wire technology. So here we go, theory not followed by any order because each and every single thing in this chapter are equally important.

Let me begin with my journey of converting from moron driving to unker driving. I used to modify cars with racing equipments, such as racing clutch, racing carburetor, multicore radiator, overlapped billet camshaft etc, to attain best response/lap timing. There was 1 time in my life, my Iswaga was stripped down to bear steel in the cabin, left with 1 bucket seat. All I have infront of me is 1 big tachometer, a vaciuum gauge, a fuel gauge, a radiator temperature gauge, and 1 oil pressure gauge but that's all. I have never known what is my travelling speed on the road, cause the only thing I pay attention is my RPM, make sure I do not overrev and causes internal damage to the engine. The racing carburetor is so powerful that the response of engine will be greatly improve between 50~150%. Later, got married, waifu pregnant, can no longer stand my ultra loud exhaust noise, stock exhaust put back on. I started to notice, things in the car going wrong 1 follow by another. Bad exhaust flow, causes valve seal leak. Sent the car for top overhaul, remove of racing carburetor and replaced back with stock carbs. Due to the pregnant wife, the customized dampers are now too stiff and not playing enough for pregnant lady. So I had to drop the LSD oiled dampers, in replaced with APM stock oil base dampers. As I drive slower, I started to expect the car to use less fuel since it's no longer fit for track racing. However, things didn't go as I wished. Despite having extremely low response, but the car aint helping me to save up much fuel as I expected. The 1st thing I plonk back my speedometer, I notice my car infact is kinda slow compare to other Iswaras. So I believe I'm using a much bigger tyre, hence the speedo is wrong. Back then, I did a rough calculation, my car can only glide through about 300km/full tank(of about 40~42litres). I started to worry if continue to be like this, my petrol budget will burn a hole in my pocket and left nothing for my children to eat.

Driving efficiently with vacuum reading
So I have begun the journey of learning to read vacuum gauge for fuel consumption purposes. Usually, a vacuum reading for me are meant for engine vital status, nothing more, nothing less. I would like to borrow some examples from the internet to help explain to you how to read vacuum readings. Please find below youtube video useful

More useful reading here
Since then, all my cars has been equipped with a piece of vacuum gauge, in order for me to monitor my driving behavior (not only vital states)



Reading a vacuum gauge while driving can be tricky, my philosophy was always stick to a certain range of vacuum reading by adjusting gas pedal input. Before we can begin with driving with vacuum, we must understand what does vacuum meter have to do with fuel efficiency? Here's the point, why do the vacuum gauge keep on going into the 0 region when I'm driving the car. This simply means, you have put in more gas pedal input than the engine momentum, translate as ACCELERATING. After some researched, I started to understand where does engine vacuum came from. When combustion happened, piston will be pushing downwards. Inside the combustion chamber is air tight, hence when the intake valve being pull opened, the piston moving downwards will create SUCTION to the entire intake system, known as vacuum. If you still interested to find out how vacuum reading can benefit in fuel efficient driving, please read on.

0~10in/hg - Throttle opening is very big, air flow is unrestricted, intake pressure is almost level with outside atmosphere.
11 ~ 15in/hg - Efficient range. Throttle is semi close/open with decent air flow restriction.
16 ~ 23in/hg - Idling. Throttle body is shut, left very limited air flow.
24 ~ 30in/hg - External momentum causes engine to stroke, hence piston vacuum was pulling downward by the crankshaft. Throttlebody still closed, but vacuum is strong as piston is moving downward extremely quickly.



For SAGA BLM/FL with IAFM, idling vacuum reading as below:
Without load: 18in/hg
With A/C: 14in/hg
With A/C + Headlights: 12in/hg
For FLX with IAFM+, idling vacuum reading +1 of IAFM.

To be continue

This post has been edited by davidke20: May 3 2014, 06:15 PM

Effective driving without vacuum gauge for SAGA BLM/FL Manual Transmission

Here's a list of transmission translation in effective driving range against vacuum reading I've compiled, I'm going to summarized it for those who do not read vacuum.

1st gear: 0~20kph
2nd gear: 21~40kph
3rd gear: 41~60kph
4th gear: 61~80kph
5th gear: 81~85kph

The above are the effective driving speed for a GaGa BLM/FL MT. Please note that the speed provided here is for reference only, more importantly is how long does it take to attain that 20kph difference after you've engaged the next gear. So what I do is, I'm going to slowly release my clutch pedal, gradually press on my gas pedal and let the car roll forward. Without drastically press on the accelerator, the car will gradually increase speed. Below is a compilation of time taken to achieve velocity

1st gear: 5seconds from 0~20kph
2nd gear: 8seconds from 21~40kph
3rd gear: 13seconds from 41~60kph
4th gear: 15seconds from 61~80kph
5th gear: ????????? from 81~85kph

Yes! It is boring! I can do 0~100kph within 10seconds, but this is FC talk! So this is what you get, unker driving style. When you have a vacuum gauge, you'll get to see the 5 seconds on 1st gear, from 0kph the car start rolling at 5in/hg gradually build up momentum, speed climbed from 0~20kph and vacuum gauge slowly pull from 5in/hg all the way to 15in/hg. Anyways, to take note on both time/speed/transmission comparisons are subjected to road condition. Do take note if it's an uphill road, it's impossible to build momentum. Hence having a vacuum gauge will be able to see whether it's time to change gear. Take an example, when you going Genting uphill, there will be certain hill climb that you feel if going on 3rd gear the car very shakey, engine vibrate alot. Instinct tell you it's time to downshift, so you did and the car goes make a loud whine, ROAR! When you look at the tachometer, it's at 6krpm. It's so loud and you'll have to hit the gas pedal almost to the metal This is the situation when there's very little momentum remain, you're at high gear, vacuum too low. Having a vacuum gauge, sticking between 10~15in/hg driving can never go wrong. Your speed will never exceed the speed limit of that road regardless downhill/uphill/flatroad, reason being that 10~15in/hg vacuum reading can also be a momentum indicator!

So, basically this is a simple guide to drive your GaGa BLM/FL. It's not the most accurate way, but it's a general idea of what's gonna happen. After long training with vacuum gauge, I can drive without looking at the gauge and achieve good FC. Next will cover with video walk-through of vacuum vs road condition on actual driving.

To be continue... ...

This post has been edited by davidke20: Sep 6 2014, 09:52 AM

* Reserved

I have heard of your work and credits Please note that I'm not a seller nor anything to deal with workshops. I'm merely an owner trying my best to contribute my point of view. Constructive feedback are more than welcome. Sarcasm to me for what? It's not like I was the 1 who suggesting sending to reflash ECU to lower the RPM. So, I'd appreciate if you put that kind of reply back to the sohigh rpm sohigh thread. Thanks.

Ayam using ATR K-Sport on Shawie, my FC drastically improved from averagely 14kml to 16kml I started wondering how much does it yield on the tire resistance. I will conduct a test when I have spare rims(very soon) since now I have both cars running on same PCD. As soon as I get my 3rd set, I can start rotating tyres from car to car for comparison

Won't save much fuel, later will update more information on following posts when I have the time.

Well, those are just basic stuff that we put together Besides, my car is already insanely fuel saving, can't possibly be any saver than what I have now

The rolling downhill in-clutch you'll get caught by the OBD2 reading. OBD2 has clearly shown you the engine is not consuming any petrol, but the amount of power loss between transmission will take away your speed much. So in short your velocity will drop very much in-clutch. With 1km rolling in-clutch of no fuel consumption, but needed acceleration after 1km of free roll; comparing with 1km rolling de-clutched with minimal fuel consumption, but vehicle speed increased by 20% after the roll, and continue to roll another 500m with minimal fuel consumption before vehicle speed drop. Which 1 would you rather be? Acceleration? Or minimal fuel consumption over a longer period? I'm not defending or trying to be hero. I leave this as healthy discussion if you like. Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty damn sure free rolling by de-clutched is extremely dangerous, as it even affect the vehicle controlability at some point.

As far as I know, only the 1st batch of SVs got some using old AchiPokai gebox. Don't be too happy with Getrag geboc also, as the sparepart is awfully expansive compare to the old school AchiPokai, which it share parts with most Nissan cars.

Agreed on most of your point of view. 1 thing need to highlight, cruise control should only be use on absolutely flat road. Try that on karak highway, you'll probably end up sucking more fuel then using your feet! Reason being, cruise control uses VACUUM and SPEED to control fuel injection rate. On an uphill slope, when speed started to drop, vacuum started to tighten, your cruise control system will pump in more fuel to compensate on the vacuum drop to match your preset speed. Put up your OBD reader and set he cruise control. You'll notice what blows your mind on an uphill

I'm serious. No troll intended. More healthy FC talk are welcome. In there, no debate. Only friendly discussion I love to hug tree, but I can't stand driving an electric car that kind acceleration. It's not that it's not fast. I believe when I go AWANA drive a golf cart even faster than I drive my Plotong on the street Its just that the electric motor feeling I doesn't really like it. Otherwise I would have save money for a Tesla

technically - no
practically - this is boleh land

400hp++ with 0 fuel consumption, if you can pay the premium, why not eh?

You can change to whatever gearbox. What if you get a gearbox:

Long final drive, but short ratio = Extremely good town driving fuel consumption. Car become very torquey and revvy. You lose top speed
Long final drive & long ratio = Moderately good fuel consumption on CERTAIN range of gear(especially during high speed cruising), depending on your engine output. But in town driving, you'll be stuck with 1st & 2nd gear with limited torque. Fuel consumption in town driving, I only got 1 word to describe it = DEVASTATING.
Short final drive & short ratio = Usually engine output is limited. K-Car uses this kinda setup to counter it's small capacity engine output. Low fuel consumption and fast pickup. Top speed 120kph
Short final drive, but long ratio = This is an ultra hi-rev engine setup. Old F1 NA engine? Superbike engine for example? Reason for having this setup is because engine capacity is limited in F1/Superbike, hence the engine can only generate limited torque. It needs a short DRIVE to keep the car torque output lively, meanwhile it takes the long ratio to gain speed when the engine revs up to 10000rpm and above.

So, ask yourself, how will longer final drive benefit? My title said, how to improve FC on the stock BLM/FL AchiPokai gebox. Your engine is always the KEY to fuel consumption. Regardless how many speed gearbox I give you, if your engine leak vacuum, you're not going to save any fuel then when the engine is running on tip top condition. For every engine, there's only 1 sweetspot that will save it's petrol consumption. The optimal output for my car is at 130kph 4th gear 5200rpm @ 81whp, 78FtLb.



Does not mean that's the best FC, but for 130kph, that's the best output my car can provide. To get best FC, my car need to stay somewhere above 2750rpm and below 3000rpm because that's where my horse power curve meet with my torque curve. Reading as 68FtLb/38whp.



So, if translate it into SPEED, I can only travel on 5th gear between 2750 ~ 3000rpm. Which means I need to stay below 100kph all time and or above 80kph. Now, I have my figure to prove my gearbox and engine optimal output range. So to tell you, I can't answer you how will your FC effect if you change gearbox. Good luck.

Theoretically yes. In actual event, no I don't think so. The engine output range is still stuck there. Clearly, the mitshi gebox has a longer ratio, but it's 3rd gear is totally out of sync compare to your AchiPokai gebox. Hence if you put an stock BLM with a stock FLX side by side for a spring, 1~2 & 3rd gear clearly the BLM/FL will tapau FLX due to it's benefit of short ratio. On the other hand, due to longer ratio on FLX, hitting the same 3000rpm at 100kph will result in more fuel due to engine takes more LOAD to produce same speed.

BUT, if you die die wanna compare and give yourself a reason to change gebox, here's the bestest reason you can ever adopt. We all know Kampro most efficient range is 90kph. If driving a BLM/FL at 110kph, that will be 3600rpm whilst taking much fuel to generate such power/torque to move the car. However, on an FLX gebox, 3200rpm on 110kph will consume much less fuel then BLM/FL gebox.

The comparison chart can be listed for same 5th gear for both BLM/FL and FLX gebox on a similar kampro engine

-Below 90kph on 5th gear, anytime BLM/FL consume less fuel then FLX gearbox due to lesser load on a short ratio gearbox
-At 90kph on 5th gear, both BLM/FL and FLX gebox will yield more or less the same because that's where the engine load the best output due to 1.3litre capacity
-Above 90kph on 5th gear, BLM/FL gearbox fall out of fuel efficiency range. Whereas FLX gearbox is still within efficiency range.

And, if that 10kph difference between 90kph 3000rpm on BLM/FL gebox compare with 100kph 3000rpm makes a lot difference to you, yes please proceed with gebox change. However, if your sole concern is saving petrol cost... Seriously I think you need atleast 12~15 years to make up that fuel consumption difference to pay for the bloody FLX gebox.

p/s: I'd rather recommend on Wajunk Kampro / Gentut / Persona gebox rather then FLX. Seriously those Getrag gebox and parts are too expansive and not worthy.