General topics » Fuel range?

Am trying to work out the realistic fuel range of my RS. With previous bikes I've always reset one of the trip meters when fuelling up and have soon worked out by trial and error how far I can push it, but the presence of the "Range" display on the RS has me a bit confused.

The owner's manual woffles on about this for a bit but is pretty muddled (it's so concerned with covering BMW's corporate arse about the accuracy of the measurement that it fails to explain it clearly). It talks about a "fuel reserve"; is that simply the amount of fuel remaining in the tank when the warning light comes on? What is (allegedly) indicated by the 'Range' display; is that literally the number of miles before the tank will run dry (assuming it's reading properly) or is that the number of miles until you're on to your 'fuel reserve', and if so how much is that?

Anywhere between 200 and 225 miles depending on how liberal you are with the go grip.

How big is the tank? I get 50-mpg.

Perhaps this site can give some insight?
http://www.fuelly.com/motorcycle/bmw/r1200rs

I generally refuel at 150 miles, but have taken the bike over 200 miles on multiple occasions. I twist the throttle pretty hard every so often, but generally take my rides fairly easy and my bike almost always gets 47-48mpg.

To the OP’s question

200 miles is minimum. My bike does 55mpg easily, but around 30 on track and up to 60+ is possible.

220 miles is what I call normal.

250 miles is possible when tootling. Maybe more.

I’ve seen 65-70 mpg average on dash. And Range 270 after a fill up. Just numbers.

Trip 2 is your friend. Along with Range. I’ve never run out and don’t intend proving a point the hard way.

For me, most rides need less than a tank full. When riding more than 220 miles in a day, I’ll simply figure out how much more I need and take a splash and dash stop along the way. When it’s convenient.

When you stop is down to personal preference and availability. It ain’t rocket science. Ride. Fill. Ride.

All above is valid info. My thinking is that the range number is supposed to be to empty. But there is a bit left when you get to zero. My guess is 10 to 15 miles. I haven't tried to push it farther than that.

You're using Imperial gallons, I assume???

Over my 20.000 km I've done, I get 17.3 km/l on average (=48 mpg UK, 41 mpg US), with a pretty sporty driving style I guess, and lots of mountains.

Normally I fill up every 250 km (150-160 miles) because I don't like range anxiety and the smaller roads I like to drive don't have to many petrol stations. Most I've done on one tank was around 300 km where I had to fill in 17 liter out of 18 capacity, so not much more than 300 possible for me!

I've got almost 5,000 miles on my 2017 and am averaging 45.3 mpg. The best I've seen is one tank at 51.5 mpg. I am usually filling up between 165 - 185 miles on the tank and that is with 3.4 to 3.8 gallons depending on how heavy I am on the throttle. Given a 4.7 gallon theoretical capacity on the tank, 210 - 220 miles per tank is what I use for trip planning purposes.

Zitat von Gaucho im Beitrag #10

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Over my 20.000 km I've done, I get 17.3 km/l on average (=48 mpg UK, 41 mpg US), with a pretty sporty driving style I guess, and lots of mountains.

Normally I fill up every 250 km (150-160 miles) because I don't like range anxiety and the smaller roads I like to drive don't have to many petrol stations. Most I've done on one tank was around 300 km where I had to fill in 17 liter out of 18 capacity, so not much more than 300 possible for me!

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I routinely saw +50 mpg ((US) on my long ride from Central Illinois to the West Coast. I've never run the bike down to nothing but when I refilled after what I thought was splutteringl I think I managed to get 4.2 US gallons in with some rocking and splashing from overfilling.

Zitat von Bob Aint Stoppin im Beitrag #8

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My thinking is that the range number is supposed to be to empty. But there is a bit left when you get to zero. My guess is 10 to 15 miles. .

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