Bad Gas Math

This has been mentioned elsewhere - like on the Machinist blog on Salon (where I first saw it) - but I can't resist saying something about it myself. And I'll also chip in a little bit of originality, by also criticizing some of the people that I've seen criticizing it.

The story is, there's a scammy company that sells a rather expensive device that allegedly increases your gas mileage. The way that it (supposedly) worksis that it uses electricity from the alternator to get hydrogen by splittingwater, and then adding that hydrogen to the air that gets mixed in the engine. The argument is that the hydrogen causes the gasoline to burn more completely and more cleanly, thus increasing the efficiently of the engine, which allows it to go further on a gallon of gasoline.

A local TV station in Florida claims to have tested the device. They tested the mileage of their news van using a dynamometer; then they mounted the device on the engine of their news van, and after giving it time to break in, put the van back on the dynamometer, and tested its mileage again.

Here's where the pathetic part comes in. They reported that before mounting the hydrogen generator on their van, they got an average mileage of 9.4 miles per gallon. After mounting it, they claim that they got 23.2 miles per gallon. Ok so far? Now, they go on to say that increasing their mileage from 9.4 to 23.2 mpg is a 61% improvement in mileage.

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