During the 1993 Golden Isles Kingfish Tournament, our fishing team was able to compute in practice with our FloScan fuel monitor exactly how many gallons of fuel we needed to make the twenty mile run. The next morning, we left the check out point with seventy gallons of fuel in our tank.

With this light load of fuel, we were able to reach the fertile waters of the St. Mary's Inlet first. (Gas weighs seven pounds per gallon; so an extra 100 gallons weighs your boat down by 700 pounds!)

Within fifteen minutes, we landed a forty-five pound kingfish, which proved to be the winning fish.

I have found by loading my fuel tank with exactly the amount of fuel that I will need for a full day of tournament fishing, my boat not only runs better, but I often get to the fish first. This is extremely important in tournament fishing. Getting to the fish first often results in catching fish that haven't been spooked by big numbers of trolling boats.

I rely on the FloScan to tell me exactly how many gallons I have burned and how many gallons of fuel that I have left in my tank. Fuel gauges are very unreliable; I need to know exactly how much fuel I will need and how much is left in my tank.

Terry Lacoss - Email: AmeliaAngler@net-magic.net

Received the two metering units February 1995 and installed them in May when the ice went out. Installation was straight forward with no problems, the directions included with meters was more than adequate.

As I mentioned when ordering the meters, I am running a 24' Alumaweld with twin 88hp. Johnson Jet units. I am operating out of Bettles on the Koyukuk River in the Brooks Range providing charters and float pick-ups. I found the stock fuel gauges in the boat to be totally unreliable, so when I saw your ad, I had to give it a try.

Upon installing the FloScans and cross-checking them with the dip stick that I had been using, I found the meters to be so accurate that I didn't even use the adjustment function. By watching the fuel flow, tach, and speed readings, I was able to drop my average fuel consumption from 8 GPH to 5 GPH. This is a real savings as gas is $2.68 per gallon and must be flown in. I had had a problem with one of the totalizers after 3 months, but after a couple of phone calls to tech support and after shipping out the meter for servicing, I had it back in ten days and working great.

I have operated the meters in temperatures ranging from 90 to 10 degrees with no problems. Once again, thanks for a great alternative to running out of gas in the middle of nowhere, north of the Arctic Circle.

Alan James - Bettles, Alaska

Fuel management is critical to the operation of my 28' deep vee sportfisherman powered by twin 350 C.I.D. gas engines. An average offshore trip typically covers 120 nautical miles running as speeds ranging from six knots trolling to cruising. Over the years, many fishing days were cut short by the uncertainty of remaining useable fuel.

Two years ago, I purchased the FloScan Cruisemaster 5500 which immediately became one of the most important instruments onboard. It has consistently provided consumption accuracy within one-percent. Upon compilation of speed and consumption data at all levels of operation, it became apparent that significant economies could be achieved through minor adjustments in cruising speed. In the case of my vessel, reducing the cruising RPM's by 150 produced a four gallon per hour total fuel savings with a loss of speed of approximately one-half knot.

The fuel savings in each of the two seasons of operation exceeded the purchase price of the instrument. In addition, the peace of mind associated with never again guessing at the ability to return to port with a margin of safety is reassuring.

My only regret is that I chose the entry level model which lacks the Tach, synchronizer and NMEA interface.

Congratulations on a spectacular product.

H. Jerry Woods -

I am writing to let you know how much I enjoy having your FloScan fuel flowmeter onboard my boat. Since I use my boat for fishing charters it is a great tool to help me keep track of the fuel being used during my outing. I can immediately figure my usable gallons and my fuel expense per trip. It also lets me know if I need to refuel before my next charter. When fishing with friends I use it to figure our shared expenses without having to guess or hurry in to refuel at the end of the day. The accuracy has been on the money, although when I first installed it I was hoping it was a little off. Its a bit of a shock going from running a light 115 H.P. rig to a heavy 225H.P. package. One of the best features is being able to figure the most efficient speed when traveling long distances. With the Bahamas only 50 miles away and the price of gasoline twice what it is in the U.S., you can save a good chunk of money knowing just how much gas you need to purchase to make a safe crossing home.

Thanks again for a great tool and feel free to refer anyone to me if they have any questions on how I use my FloScan.

Captain Ron Mallet - Davie, Florida

What a pleasure meeting you this past week at the golf course and learning you work for FloScan.  Thanks to a friend of mine who lives in Florida and has owned numerous airplanes equipped with FloScan fuel flow meters, I learned about your product and how important it is to have on my boats.  

It is most comforting to know "exactly" how much fuel I am consuming at my current RPM’s as well as how much fuel I have consumed overall and thus know how much fuel I have remaining.  I installed FloScan fuel flow meters on my prior and current boats and would not even think about operating a boat for any distance without them.  While our FloScan fuel flow meter is important for cruising in our boat around the Puget Sound, it was most critical in our trip this past year from Seattle to Alaska.

Our boat, a 35' Bayliner aft-cabin has twin 454 gas engines and thus has a limited cruising range of only approximately 100 miles.  While my research on this trip provided me with enough fuel stops along the way, there were many legs of the trip where there was very little margin for error.  Such factors as strong currents, extreme tide changes and winds play a major role in getting from point A to point B without running out of fuel.  Without our FloScan fuel flow meter, I would not have been comfortable taking this trip.  It's a great product and I don't understand why all manufacturers of all size motor yachts don't make this standard equipment.

Great product!!

Cameron Strong - Seattle, WA

From his desk at the FloScan Instrument Co. in Seattle’s University District, Ken McCoy-LaForce helped bring Voyager home. He reassured the experimental aircraft’s ground crew—by telephone—that it was safe to continue the historic around-the-world flight despite signs that the aircraft was going to run out of fuel. 

The lightweight plane landed safely at Edwards Air Force Base in California on Tuesday, after traveling nearly 26,000 miles without stopping or refueling.  There were some tense moments. The problem, which almost grounded the nine-day flight, was that one of the fuel-flow sensors indicated the aircraft would run out of fuel over the Atlantic. Another said the Voyager had enough fuel to continue. 

The dilemma for Voyager’s pilots:  Which sensor should they believe?  The solution:  Call the people who make them.  On a Friday morning before Christmas, McCoy-LaForce, the company’s troubleshooter, was finishing some work before going to an office party when he got a call from the Voyager crew chief, Jack Norris. “I was surprised and he was panicked,” said McCoy-Laforce.  “The crew was bouncing off the walls, they were short on sleep and had no idea what was going on up there and which sensor they should believe.  They were seriously thinking about aborting the flight.” 

Based on his conversation with Voyager ground-crew members, he determined that the fuel sensor in Voyager’s wing tank wasprobably showing more fuel had been consumed because of the turbulence it was experiencing. The sensor in the engine tank showed a higher fuel level and was the one the crew should observe, McCoy-LaForce told Norris. The fuel sensors use a paddle-wheel turbine to measure the flow of liquid fuel moving past them.  The faster the turbine moves, the more fuel there is. McCoy-LaForce says the fuel sensor cannot read a fuel level lower than actual flow.  But certain unusual circumstances, like excessive turbulence, can cause it to read higher. “I told them that if I was in the plane I would trust the sensor in the engine tank and continue the flight.  I have a lot of faith in these sensors.  Knowing what I know about the, I told them to go on,” said McCoy-LaForce.

They did go on, and the rest is history. Company President Charles Wurster said, “We didn’t even know our sensors were on the aircraft until they called us.  It was pretty exciting.” He said FloScan sold the sensor to an avionics company, which in turn sold it to the Voyager crew. FloScan, founded in Seattle in 1969, has made fuel sensors for aviation manufacturers such as Cessna, Piper and Beech.

By Janice Hayes
Times Staff reporter
December, 1986

Voyager Puzzle Solved - Seattle, WA

Foss Maritime, one of the largest tug boat companies with over 200 vessels operating worldwide, tested FloScan Fuel Computers on the M/V Justine Foss powered by twin EMD 12-645 2150 hp engines. This tug operated between Washington and Alaska running approximately 1000 nautical miles each way. The Justine Foss made 8 round trips using approximately 80,000 gallons of fuel per trip.

Dana Brodie, Ocean Port Engineer for Foss Maritime, determined the accuracy of the FloScan Fuel Computers to be within ½ of 1% for the entire 640,000 gallons used! As a result, the equipment is now being used for fuel billing purposes and other vessels, such as the Drew and the Wendy Foss, have been outfitted with FloScan Fuel Computers.
 
The system Foss Maritime has installed is the Series 9000 GPS Interface model which displays Engine Hours, RPM’s, Gallons Per Hour, Gallons Used, and Nautical Miles Per Gallon. This system totally eliminates the need for calculating and plotting a fuel/speed curve since the boat operator can reach optimum fuel efficiency by simply changing the throttle position successively until the instrument’s MPG reading peaks. Furthermore, the system pays for itself many times over with the fuel savings obtained by running at the peak efficiency point at all times.

Foss Maritime - Seattle, WA

July, 2005

I installed a FloScan fuel management system on my boat that I re-powered with a 4 cylinder turbo'd Yanmar 4LHM-STE 230 hp diesel . I installed the diesel 8 years ago after putting 1200 hours on the gas engine. I sold the gas engine and tranny while it still ran well but was becoming a bit noisy.

In the 8 years of running the boat with the diesel, I never knew, not even close, what my miles per gallon truly was at any given speed or engine RPMs. With the FloScan now installed (by myself) I can now determine that I can realistically get 6.15 nautical miles per gallon (FloScan always reads GPS data as nautical) @ 1,370 RPM. Speed over ground is 7 statute MPH, + or - 0.2 MPH. That is my absolute maximum MPG as determined by my observations by adjusting my RPMs and speed upward @ 1,000 RPM increments and writing it down in my log book. The calculations are done by the FloScan instrument's mini computer that receives info from my GPS plotter and so, real time updating is constantly being digitally displayed and the info ...RPMs, SMPG, engine hours accumulated and gallons consumed since refill are all real time current and relative to your time and distance on the move.

I would have never had the patience to go 7 MPH (in my 31 MPH boat) for any necessary length of time to make the determination that my maximum range and MPG is specifically at 1,370 RPMs. The beauty of it all is that to arrive at that determination, I only had to set the boat on autopilot and on calm waters, observe the data reported by the LCD display on the FloScan instrument which delivered the data within 30 seconds of my adjusted (set) engine RPMs. You have got to love it and after experiencing it you will.

June 13th my boat leaves St. Pete for Chicago on a flat bed semi rig just so I can do another rivers trip from the Great Lakes to my St. Pete water front (ICW) home. I keep my 1976 restored and customized 26' Silverton on a lift at my home. When I bought the boat in Milwaukee back in '91, it had anti-fouling bottom paint on it. I ran the boat down the rivers then and finally, after all these years, the bottom paint was almost washed off. With a pressure cleaner, I blasted off almost all of the remaining loose and degraded bottom paint and with the boat on the lift, I painted the bottom with a polyurethane paint that makes the bottom a shiny, hard "fast" bottom. Since the boat is always on a lift when not moving, I figured why not a fast bottom to see what effect it would have on my MPG and speed. The result is startling.

I had the boat out for a trial run and @ my upper end cruising RPMs, my MPH has increased by 4.7 MPH! My SMPG appears to have improved by 0.7 NMPG! All of my previously recorded observations will now have to be re-recorded, as the performance and efficiency has, without a doubt, improved.

A word about fuel management system choice. Before I buy any electronics for my boat or home, I conduct a "performance test" of sorts on the seller and or manufacturer's sales and tech support. My first priority is make sure that in the case of a problem, I can reach the seller's/manufacturer's sales and tech support by phone. I was able to do this easily with both Raymarine and FloScan. No hoops to jump through. Just called the support number and began talking with a rep immediately....and that was before I even purchased the item! No one ever asked my for documentation of a purchase so as to qualify me for a dialogue.

A word about installation. I did install the FloScan myself, as well as the diesel engine and Raymarine plotter. I have had extensive experience in rigging boats and internal combustion engine maintenance and repair. I am capable and confident with a history of installations of all kinds that make me so. If you are similarly experienced and confident, go for it. FloScan has a free video CD that explains the function more so than actually demonstrating the installation.

I have to give both FloScan and Raymarine high marks for their accessibility when needed.

Edward Blau - St. Petersburg, FL

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