Strange 'Range' Behavior

[Dan DiBiase]

Took my A4 on it's first road trip in a while, from Central NJ to Saratoga Springs, NY and back. A function of our new car having satellite
radio, I guess...! Anyway, was surprised at the fuel mileage - averaged 35 mpg each way - granted, it's 99% highway miles, and traffic
was light so the cruise was set at 72 mph and hardly had to touch it. That is higher mileage than I have gotten in the past, by a couple of mpg's. 

The strange thing was the range computation. Going up, I used just under half a tank of gas so I was monitoring the range closely to see how
far I could get before I needed to stop to ensure I didn't roll into the driveway on fumes - second half of the tank always seems to go faster
than the first.... ;-) When I got onto the highway, the range actually went up about 10 miles, which I assumed was due to the better gas mileage
I was getting than in the little bit of stop-and-go traffic approaching the Northway. It kept going up for a while, then starting going down, but at
a very uneven rate, and finally sat on 235 miles for a good 20 minutes (during which time I would have driven about 24 miles). So I ended up
pulling off and putting some gas in but didn't reset the computer. Got back on the highway and the range read 440 miles, then proceeded to
drop about 5 miles for every 2 miles driven until it seemed to be at a 'normal' level for the fuel I had remaining in the tank - then went down
normally at that point.


I always assumed that the range calc was a simple 'look at the fuel level, look at the mph and compute' sort of thing and don't recall it ever
fluctuating so much.

Anyway, it was nice to get reconnected with the car, since it doesn't get much use now that my daughter has gone to college and her Mini
Cooper is sitting there calling for me to drive it.... But I wish it had satellite radio....


Dan D
'04 A4 1.8Tq MT-6
Central NJ USA