Hyper-Mileing

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harry j

harry j

Joined
Dec 16, 2005
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Location
Wilmington, NC
With the price of gas heading to the $4 dollar a gallon mark, how many of you are thinking of changing your driving habits.
Using the brakes as little as possible, coasting, anticipating traffic light changes, just letting road friction slow you down.
Emptying the trunk, pumping up the tire pressure, stuff like that.

'93 Civic, 245,000 miles
 
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I started about a year ago. I also bought a Scangauge II to constantly monitor my fuel economy. Without it I find it easy to not drive in an ideal fashion. With the trip average constantly looking me in the face it almost becomes a game to see how high I can get the number.

If I just drive how I prefer (average or slightly more agressive than average) then I'll get 24-26 in warmer weather driving back and forth to work in my Grand Prix GT. If I drive slower on the freeway, acclerate very gently, coast as far as possible coming up to stops, etc. then I can usually keep my fuel economy between 28-30.
 
I'm considering going to "wholesale club" to get my tires filled with nitrogen. the benefit is no tire pressure gain or loss across temperature swings. incremental gain but a gain nonetheless.
 
I try to slow down, but everything about driving in Charlotte seems to hurt fuel economy. You never catch a series of green lights here. There is no trick to catching green lights, it just won't happen. All those cars doing all that idling every day because our traffic lights are completely out of sync with the traffic patterns can't be good. We also have constant traffic jams at all hours of the day here, so that hurts fuel economy. On the highway, I try to maintain a steady speed, but there are so many wrecks on I-85, and I-77 always backs up on to I-85, so fuel economy suffers then when I get stuck in traffic jams. Because the entire city of Charlotte separates my home from my job, there isn't really an alternative route I can take. Every road I can take will have heavy traffic.
 
Big reason not to live around there if one has a choice not to. I have a friend who just took a new job in sales there and I warned him. It's gonna be way worse than the little bit of traffic he sees in Greenville SC where he's always lived.
 
Originally Posted By: lewk
I'm considering going to "wholesale club" to get my tires filled with nitrogen. the benefit is no tire pressure gain or loss across temperature swings. incremental gain but a gain nonetheless.



Good idea lewk, I had this done some time ago. I had them pump up the pressure to 36# even though Honda called for 32#. I find that the tire pressure is maintained for longer than just using
pump air. I like the fact that nitrogen is very dry. Just look at all the moisture that comes out of the air pump at your local
gas emporium, not good.
 
I normally get 38+ MPG in combined driving and recently 45.5 MPG
HWY.
I'm wondering why so many drivers approach a red light as though it is green and then stomp on the brakes at the last moment. My last set of brakes were changed at 118,000 miles. They had maybe another 5k to go,
but I think I got my money's worth. I read that it is not unusual for some cars to have their binders changed at 20,000 miles or less!
 
Originally Posted By: WishIhadatruck
I started about a year ago. I also bought a Scangauge II to constantly monitor my fuel economy. Without it I find it easy to not drive in an ideal fashion. With the trip average constantly looking me in the face it almost becomes a game to see how high I can get the number.

If I just drive how I prefer (average or slightly more agressive than average) then I'll get 24-26 in warmer weather driving back and forth to work in my Grand Prix GT. If I drive slower on the freeway, acclerate very gently, coast as far as possible coming up to stops, etc. then I can usually keep my fuel economy between 28-30.


I wish I could use the Scangauge. My car has the OBE1. Does anyone make a version for an older car?
I applaud your efforts in coasting whenever possible, as you can see it makes a difference in the MPG's. Your brakes will last longer as well.
 
I heard for the first time mention of $5 per gallon, isn't $4 bad enough? We will need vehicles more in the 50 to 60 MPG range,
even some of the hybrids are not actually getting that.
 
I'm a coaster. In fact, I've picked up all of the driving habits of my dad that I used to hate. My factory tires on the TL lasted twice as long as most peoples and my front brakes are showing no noticable wear at 60K. I laugh when I hit several lights with someone and they floor it to the next light and slam on brakes at the last second and then I coast up to them. We're still side by side only I used about 1/3 the gas and brakes to get there. My girlfriend is my exact opposite.

I should add that coasting is especially nice in any modern fuel injected motor since the injectors shut off when the throttle is closed and rpms above idle.
 
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Yeah I picked up most of that stuff from driving my truck. It doesn't have enough power to get out of its own way and doesn't have the best brakes in the world. So you have to try to read ahead and waste as little power as possible.

Another thing I have found is if you have an auto transmission that has a tap shift kind of set up. Well it may be advantageous to use it. From my experience that point at which your cars allows you to shift and the point where it shifts are different. In my case this is largely seen at 45 mph where in auto mode you are in 5th gear but in manual you can go into 6th and cut 400 to 500 rpms out.
 
careful driving, (my rant about braking on the interstate from the other day) goes a long way...

gentle acceleration and slow driving does a heck of a lot.

High tire pressure (sidewall max, though some do higher!) combined with gentle driving has been shown time and time again by hypermilers to not sacrifice tire life, and many are going on poor-longevity OE tires for 60-100k.

Shutting down your engine, though some consider it a no-no, makes a lot of sense at poorly designed intersections where a lot of time is spent stopped at lights. Old studies claimed it takes about 30 seconds worth of gas at idle to equal the amount necessary to start an engine. Newer studies claim 10-20 seconds.

Main problem is that folks never learned how the car really behaves besides mash the go pedal and go, thanks to the proliferation of AT-equipped cars.

JMH
 
Originally Posted By: Steve S
It is wise to go with the traffic flow .Getting into an accident will eliminate any savings in gas.


Sure Steve, this is not something you can absolutely do at all times. Depending on traffic patterns, I sometimes have to temper my driving habits to more saftely drive to accomodate other motoring terrorists. Some of the best Grand Prix driving I have ever seen is on public roadways.
 
Originally Posted By: oilyriser
Tires are at 35 psi, 0w20 oil in engine, 75w90 in diffs, 55mpg max speed. Beating EPA numbers by 25%.



What weight oil did your car originally call for? How does it run on the 0W20?
 
Can't really do any of that, with "freeways" consisting of 5-10 mph traffic, and stop lights that take 2 or 3 cycles for the entire line of cars to get through them. Tried it for a tank just to see what kinds of results I got; normal driving for me (mostly city) returns about 26 mpg, "hyper miling" got me a hair under 28. Not really much of a difference imo, especially in terms of how many people I [censored] off.
 
I've also found that shifting my hours so I leave earlier to get to work and leave earlier to get home makes it easier to drive more economically. Obviously not an option for everyone but if you can it really helps. There are a lot fewer cars on the road at 5:00-5:30 in the morning than later on.
 
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