Diesel Fill Up June 27, 2006

I need to answer a question for myself before I continue to fill up on Bio-diesel. Please note - I will continue to fill up on Bio-diesel after this tank. Is Bio-diesel the cause of the decreased mileage I am achieving, or is there another factor? To answer this, I had to fill up on, sorry to say, regular grade diesel fuel for this tank. Is this a cop-out or an experiment? I'm not sure, to tell the truth.

Other items of note with the 240D:

I love the new stereo head unit and speakers - photos to follow. I can add up to 17 ablums on one CD using MP3 formatting. I currently have two CD's in the car with 32 albums between them! There are four 2-way speakers now in the car that sound great. I feel that, to play loud modern music, I will need a sub-woofer at some point. I miss the bass that the ML320 develops (it has a sub-woofer under the driver seat).

I just installed "diamond cut" headlights that fit right into the space vacated by the old yellow-cast 7" sealed beam units. Wow, the 85W H-4 lamps emit a white light that really illuminates the road.

Efficiency summary: 160 mile round-trip to Socorro to create the punch list for Cramer Hall at New Mexico Tech plus around 120 miles of in-town driving

General conditions: driver and two passengers, 75 MPH highway driving and in-town with various passenger loads

June 27, 2006 Diesel Fill-up in Albuquerque
13.45 Gallons @$2.93 per gallon = $39.40
286 miles @ 21.26 MPG - city/highway driving