Chipped car & Distance To Empty - Ford Forums

loxxr6 · 10-13-2004, 17:07

Has anyone had any probs with their distance to empty display being off since chipping their car. By off I mean not showing the correct DTE.

I haven't driven the car enough lately to notice it but my g/f who does seems to think that the display isn't a 100% accurate.

Is this a common problem ? Or is she imagining things ?

Casper · 10-13-2004, 17:12

The DTE is never super accruate. I've had mine showing 20kms to go before the needle was even in the red and another time the car actually ran out of fuel with 64kms showing on the DTE....not impressed.

The reason it is off is because it is an average. If you drive your car in peak hour stop start traffic and then on a clear freeway it loses the plot because the variance in fuel use per km travelled is huge. I never trust the DTE anymore, I always go by where the needle is, its far more accurate as it just shows how much fuel is left.

stockstandard · 10-13-2004, 21:12

I haven't had any problems with it. In fact it has always seemed very accurate on my car (EF).

Street Tuner · 10-13-2004, 21:54

With the standard program in the PCM, and a piggyback chip with larger injectors, the average fuel calculation will be out by a mile, but it doesnt seem to affect the DTE too much. Good news is that with larger injectors and the SCT Advantage Edit - where you actually tell the PCM how big the injectors are - all the fuel calculations become perfect again.

Bluedriver · 10-14-2004, 01:53

yep my DTE problem is thats there's never enough k's out of the tank lol

loxxr6 · 10-14-2004, 05:07

yep my DTE problem is thats there's never enough k's out of the tank lol

I hear ya on that one....

XRFPV8 · 10-14-2004, 10:49

never had a problem with mine before or after chip, but my dads BA XT is dead stock he has run out of fuel 3 times he is going bannana's with it...1st time 43klm 2nd 16klm 3rd 64klm DTE....

loxxr6 · 10-14-2004, 17:28

I've heard of the commies having that prob when the VT first came in. The tank would be empty and the DTE would read anything from 50-100kms left.

In the time I've driven the car I've found our DTE display to be fairly accurate. Maybe its just the increase in petrol cost and my g/f thinking she's got more than what she actually has.

Thanks.

jonbays · 10-15-2004, 22:02

I found my dte to be quite accurate even after the mods but.... it can be fooled.

I can drive home with it showing 40km to go and in fuel guage the red, fuel light on and 380km on the trip meter from last fill. All good and correct.

Then I park overnight in the steep uphill part of my driveway and next morning I have 80km DTE fuel light off and fuel guage just out of the red. As i drive the fuel guage goes down into the red and the fuel light comes on and the DTE drops but rather too slowly to be any good any more. So I fill up 65L at 416km with 60k DTE and maybe 3L of fuel left.

I can reverse in and get the reverse to happen Full tank and 430k dte reverse in and drive out next day and 260dte!!! It does correct itself but very gradually.

maybe its Station wagon tanks and their fuel sensor positioning who knows.

Turbo_EA · 10-17-2004, 23:10

My dad's got a series one Au. It isn't chipped but i do remember driving it and having fun with the DTE. He used to know if I had been fanging it, cause i'd give it back to him with 80k's left. He'd drive it around town and it would slowly come up to 4-500. He drives like a grandpa though. He he, old fart.