I recall that private aircraft fuel gauges need to only read correctly 2 thing.
Full & empty.
Somehow I don’t think you need a gauge to read empty when flying
Neil Andersen, W3NEA
Rock Hall, MD 21661
484-354-8800
From: Della Barba, Joe via CnC-List
Sent: Wednesday, June 28, 2023 3:40:06 PM
To: Stus-List
Cc: Della Barba, Joe
Subject: Stus-List Re: [EXTERNAL] Re: Accurate Fuel Tank Measurements
Aircraft fuel gauges suck! The tanks are very wide but shallow, so the readings
are not very accurate. If you have the better capacitive fuel gauge senders
that helps. If you think about a float gauge in a tank that is 4-6 inches tall,
the float itself bottoms out at around 1/8 of a tank or so. Some airplanes have
dihedral (wings angled up at the tips), so a sender at the bottom of the slope
will read full at a half tank and one at the top of the slope would read empty
at a half tank.
What I really like is a fuel totalizer, this is an instrument that measures
fuel flow and gallons used. Some of them are linked to the GPS and will set off
an alarm if your fuel looks to be used up before you reach your destination.
You too can buy capacitive fuel senders for not a lot of money. $500 or so will
get you a totalizer, but many of them get inaccurate at the low flow rates
typical of sailboats.
* Air Canada famously ran their 757 out of fuel because the fuel gauges had
crapped out and they were relying on the totalizer. Their plan would have
worked but for metric system confusion. They did something like ask for 2,000
gallons of fuel and get 2,000 liters. They programmed the totalizer with 2,000
gallons added and it did not know any better.
** Some sadistic engineer configured some Beech Barons with 4 fuel tanks and 2
gauges. Entertainment ensues when you have the tanks switched to A and the
gauges switched to B. How can we be out of gas, the gauges say full???
Joe Della Barba
Coquina
From: cenelson--- via CnC-List
Sent: Tuesday, June 27, 2023 10:44 PM
To: Stus-List
Cc: Korbey Hunt ; Peter W. ;
cenel...@aol.com
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Stus-List Re: Accurate Fuel Tank Measurements
II am not a pilot but suspect that given the consequences of running out of
fuel at 10,000 feet, a different technology is used for airplane fuel tanks—if
not, I am sure such tanks are calibrated more accurately than most boat fuel
tanks!
Charlie Nelson
Water Phantom
C 36 XL/kcb
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