What affects the the amount of fuel a car uses

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What affects the the amount of fuel a car uses?
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Fuel Consumption

• Measured in number of miles the car will travel
  on 1 gallon of petrol.
• In science we should measure in km/litre however
  all available data in miles/gallon or mpg
• The miles/gallon is worked out for an average
  journey including fast motorway driving and slow
  town driving.

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Energy transfer

• Fuel is a concentrated source of energy.
• In the car engine the fuel is combined with
  oxygen.
• The energy is transferred to the wheels of the
  car.
• Some engines are more efficient than others. This
  means that they transfer more energy to the
  useful function (eg movement) and less as heat
  and sound.

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The task

• You are starting out in car design. You are
  concerned about the environment and you want to
  reduce the amount of fuel used.
• You need to consider what factors affect the
  number of miles a car will go on each gallon of
  petrol.
• (Assume that engines are equally efficient)

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Factors

• Type of fuel
• Size of the engine
• Mass of the car
• Power of the engine
• Shape of the car

Petrol/diesel Litres Kg acceleration (time to
change speed from 0-60 mph make
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• Draw scattergraphs to compare miles/gallon with
  each factor

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Suggestion

• There are only 2 types of fuel.
• Filter the fuel column so that you can compare
  the factors (mass, engine size, acceleration,
  make) for petrol cars then diesel cars.

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EXCEL support

• To filter.
• Select all data (click empty cell in top left
  next to A column label)
• On tool bar select DATA, then FILTER.
• Select AUTOFILTER.
• Select the arrow on the top of fuel column and
  choose petrol.

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EXCEL support

• Sort the miles/ gallon column in ascending order
  (select all DATA SORT Column E ascending).
• Highlight miles/gallon column and then (holding
  down control key) highlight another column.
• Click the chart icon. Choose scattergraph.
• Follow the wizard. Label the chart.

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RESEARCH

• There has been much publicity about the Honda
  Insight.
• Honda claim that this car with its new engine
  design will give a fuel consumption of over
  70mpg.
• Use the INTERNET to find out why this engine is
  so different.