mis-information correction station

This is something I've been meaning to rant about for a while.

situation #1.
Many people claim they know someone who knows a guy who has a friend whose brother's coworker developed some chip or some magical device for cars that doubles/triples/whatever their gas mileage.

situation #2
Oil companies are in bed with car companies and car companies are making cars less fuel efficient so we have to buy more gas.

As a frustrated hearer of these things its time to speak out. yes. BOTH SITUATIONS ARE NOT TRUE. Let me explain it very plainly. The primary ingredients to gas mileage are Air/fuel ratio, RPM, VE (volumetric efficiency), ignition timing, drivetrain loss (there are more but these are some big ones)

I'm only going to write in depth on one of these, the air/fuel ratio. To achieve optimum combustion you want all the gasoline to be burned with all the oxygen in the air. There should only be reactants from this, if there is leftover gas or oxygen than the combustion was less than ideal. It takes 14.7 parts of air PER PART of gas to create an ideal combustion in a gasoline motor. 14.7 is what cars are programmed for under light throttle cruising applications. If it gets leaner, it can cause detonation, to rich and you are just wasting gas. THERE IS NO MAGICAL CHIP THAT CAN OVERCOME CHEMISTRY. Your uncle's brothers friend's coworker (or whatever) is a phony.

Now as far as the other things, sure they can be improved. But to what cost? Creating a drive train with substantially improved efficiency would be a very expensive venture leading to the cost of purchase being much higher.

Other things such as ignition timing are usually programmed for optimum efficiency(as optimum as possible) from the factory, while allowing for variables to make sure all the idiots out there don't wreck their cars.

In this economy making a car that gets truly amazing gas mileage would be a HUGE selling point. There is no financial gain for a car company to purposely hurt its fleet's mpg.

There I am done.