Driving and Car Maintenance: Transportation accounts for 66% of U.S.
oil use -mainly in the form of gasoline. Luckily, there are plenty of
ways to improve gas mileage.

Driving Tips:- Idling gets you 0 miles per gallon. The best way to
warm up a vehicle is to drive it. No more than 30 seconds of idling
on
winter days is needed. Anything more simply wastes fuel and increases
emissions.- Aggressive driving (speeding, rapid acceleration, and
hard
braking) wastes gas. It can lower your highway gas mileage 33% and
city mileage 5%. Drive at lowest and constant rpms; 2000 rpm are
enough; you can save up to 30%. Even a Porsche can be driven at the
4th gear at 20 mph and at the 6th gear at 50 mph with 2.5 times less
fuel consumption.- Avoid high speeds. Driving 75 mph, rather than 65
mph, could cut your fuel economy by 15%.- When you use overdrive
gearing, your cars engine speed goes down. This saves gas and reduces
wear.- Use air conditioning only when necessary.- Clear out your car;
extra weight decreases gas mileage. Each 60 pounds increases fuel
consumption by 10%. - Reduce drag by placing items inside
the car or trunk rather than on roof racks. A roof rack or carrier
provides additional cargo space and may allow you to buy a smaller
car. However, a loaded roof rack can decrease your fuel economy by
5%.- Check into carpooling and public transit to cut mileage and car
maintenance costs.


Car Maintenance Tips:- Use the grade of motor oil recommended by your
cars manufacturer. Using a different motor oil can lower your
gasoline
mileage by 1% to 2%.- Keep tires properly inflated and aligned to
improve your gasoline mileage by around 3.3%.- Get regular engine
tune-ups and car maintenance checks to avoid fuel economy problems due
to
worn spark plugs, dragging brakes, low transmission fluid, or
transmission problems.- Replace clogged air filters to improve gas
mileage by as much as 10% and protect your engine.- Combine errands
into one trip. Several short trips, each one taken from a cold start,
can use twice as much fuel as one trip covering the same distance
when
the engine is warm. Do not forget that in the first mile your car
uses
8 times more fuel, in the second mile 4 times and only after the
fourth mile it becomes normal.Long-Term Savings Tip- Consider buying
a
highly fuel-efficient vehicle. A fuelefficient vehicle, a hybrid
vehicle, or an alternative fuel vehicle could save you a lot at the
gas pump and help the environment.See the Fuel Economy Guide
(www.fueleconomy.gov) for more on buying a new fuel-efficient car or
truck.


Source:
www.eere.energy.gov and
http://www.vcd.org/155.html

".." wrote in message
...
hard
braking) wastes gas.


Never seen gas powered brakes.

... wrote:
Driving and Car Maintenance: Transportation accounts for 66% of U.S.
oil use -mainly in the form of gasoline. Luckily, there are plenty of
ways to improve gas mileage.

Driving Tips:- Idling gets you 0 miles per gallon. The best way to
warm up a vehicle is to drive it. No more than 30 seconds of idling
on
winter days is needed. Anything more simply wastes fuel and increases
emissions.- Aggressive driving (speeding, rapid acceleration, and
hard
braking) wastes gas. It can lower your highway gas mileage 33% and
city mileage 5%. Drive at lowest and constant rpms; 2000 rpm are
enough; you can save up to 30%. Even a Porsche can be driven at the
4th gear at 20 mph and at the 6th gear at 50 mph with 2.5 times less
fuel consumption.- Avoid high speeds. Driving 75 mph, rather than 65
mph, could cut your fuel economy by 15%.- When you use overdrive
gearing, your cars engine speed goes down. This saves gas and reduces
wear.- Use air conditioning only when necessary.- Clear out your car;
extra weight decreases gas mileage. Each 60 pounds increases fuel
consumption by 10%. - Reduce drag by placing items inside
the car or trunk rather than on roof racks. A roof rack or carrier
provides additional cargo space and may allow you to buy a smaller
car. However, a loaded roof rack can decrease your fuel economy by
5%.- Check into carpooling and public transit to cut mileage and car
maintenance costs.


Car Maintenance Tips:- Use the grade of motor oil recommended by your
cars manufacturer. Using a different motor oil can lower your
gasoline
mileage by 1% to 2%.- Keep tires properly inflated and aligned to
improve your gasoline mileage by around 3.3%.- Get regular engine
tune-ups and car maintenance checks to avoid fuel economy problems due
to
worn spark plugs, dragging brakes, low transmission fluid, or
transmission problems.- Replace clogged air filters to improve gas
mileage by as much as 10% and protect your engine.- Combine errands
into one trip. Several short trips, each one taken from a cold start,
can use twice as much fuel as one trip covering the same distance
when
the engine is warm. Do not forget that in the first mile your car
uses
8 times more fuel, in the second mile 4 times and only after the
fourth mile it becomes normal.Long-Term Savings Tip- Consider buying
a
highly fuel-efficient vehicle. A fuelefficient vehicle, a hybrid
vehicle, or an alternative fuel vehicle could save you a lot at the
gas pump and help the environment.See the Fuel Economy Guide
(www.fueleconomy.gov) for more on buying a new fuel-efficient car or
truck.


Source:
www.eere.energy.gov and
http://www.vcd.org/155.html

This advice originated with the government, so you know you can trust it.

On 02/27/2010 03:22 PM, .. wrote:

Driving Tips:- Idling gets you 0 miles per gallon. The best way to
warm up a vehicle is to drive it. No more than 30 seconds of idling
on winter days is needed.

I disagree with this one. At -40 and below, a few more minutes makes
the engine note even out and the car feels a lot happier. That said, I
also disagree with those that idle for long periods of time...there was
a guy across the street that used to idle his truck for half an hour
before leaving.

The part about driving in 4th gear at 20mph is pushing it a bit...I have
a 1.8L engine that doesn't develop peak power until about 6000rpm.
Driving anything below 30mph in 4th means its lugging badly.

Chris

On 02/27/2010 10:46 PM, Mark & Juanita wrote:

Didn't read the whole thing -- was there anything in there about tire
gages?


"Keep tires properly inflated and aligned to
improve your gasoline mileage by around 3.3%"

Chris

On 3/1/2010 2:46 PM, Edward A. Falk wrote:
In ,
wrote:

wrote in message
...
hard
braking) wastes gas.


Never seen gas powered brakes.

Every joule of heat energy dissipated by the brakes represents wasted
energy that originally came from gasoline. A better approach is to take
your foot off the gas as you approach a stop.

In a sense, hard braking doesn't waste gas -- it's an indicator that
you've *already* wasted the gas.

So let's see, I've coasted down a long hill and I brake slowly at the
bottom or I brake hard but later at the bottom, what does doing the
latter have to do with "wasting gas"?

I've cruised 100 miles on the interstate, at the speed limit, and I hit
the brakes hard to avoid hitting a
dog/moose/deer/one-eyed-one-horned-flying-purple-people-eater that ran
into the road in front of me. How does that indicate that I have
"already wasted the gas"?

Or I'm coming to a stop sign and I brake hard shortly before I reach the
stopping point vs less hard over a longer distance, how does that
indicate that I have "already wasted the gas"?

Yeah, one might save a _tiny_ amount by getting off the gas 20 feet
sooner--at 15 mpg doing that would perhaps save .000025 gallon. So to
save a single gallon I have to do it about 4000 times. So let's see, on
my regular commute there are about 25 stops, so that would save me 2
gallons a year. Except that I usually commute that distance in a
vehicle that gets 45 mpg, so that would save me about 3/4 gallon a year.
And that assumes getting off the gas completely stopped fuel
consumption, which it doesn't.

Sorry, but while the driving habits that lead to habitual hard braking
may also lead to suboptimal fuel consumption hard braking per se doesn't
indicate anything much about "wasting gas".

Chris Friesen wrote in
el:

On 02/27/2010 03:22 PM, .. wrote:

Driving Tips:- Idling gets you 0 miles per gallon. The best way to
warm up a vehicle is to drive it. No more than 30 seconds of idling
on winter days is needed.

I disagree with this one. At -40 and below, a few more minutes makes
the engine note even out and the car feels a lot happier. That said,
I also disagree with those that idle for long periods of time...there
was a guy across the street that used to idle his truck for half an
hour before leaving.

Well, to many people around here "winter day" means 20F-40F. Not -40F
and colder. ;-) Some cars just feel cold and stiff for the first few
minutes unless you do let them run several minutes, even at 20F.

Now when you're going to be sitting for several minutes, shut that
engine off. Unless something's broke or it's really windy, the average
car isn't going to go from 72F to 20F in 20 minutes.

The part about driving in 4th gear at 20mph is pushing it a bit...I
have a 1.8L engine that doesn't develop peak power until about
6000rpm. Driving anything below 30mph in 4th means its lugging badly.

Chris

Well... That's really what the overdrive is for. Not below 30mph (I
think most cars kick them in around 50-55mph), but to reduce engine RPM
at high speed. And actually many engines are supposed to be most
efficient running around 3/4 throttle.

Puckdropper
--
Never teach your apprentice everything you know.

Puckdropper wrote:
Chris Friesen wrote in
el:

On 02/27/2010 03:22 PM, .. wrote:

Driving Tips:- Idling gets you 0 miles per gallon. The best way to
warm up a vehicle is to drive it. No more than 30 seconds of idling
on winter days is needed.

I disagree with this one. At -40 and below, a few more minutes makes
the engine note even out and the car feels a lot happier. That said,
I also disagree with those that idle for long periods of time...there
was a guy across the street that used to idle his truck for half an
hour before leaving.

Well, to many people around here "winter day" means 20F-40F. Not -40F
and colder. ;-) Some cars just feel cold and stiff for the first few
minutes unless you do let them run several minutes, even at 20F.

Now when you're going to be sitting for several minutes, shut that
engine off. Unless something's broke or it's really windy, the
average car isn't going to go from 72F to 20F in 20 minutes.

The part about driving in 4th gear at 20mph is pushing it a bit...I
have a 1.8L engine that doesn't develop peak power until about
6000rpm. Driving anything below 30mph in 4th means its lugging badly.

Chris

Well... That's really what the overdrive is for. Not below 30mph (I
think most cars kick them in around 50-55mph), but to reduce engine
RPM at high speed. And actually many engines are supposed to be most
efficient running around 3/4 throttle.

Puckdropper

3/4 throttle without specifying the gear doesn't mean anything. 3/4 throttle
in overdrive gear in my car is probably 130mph, which probably isn't it's
most fuel efficient.

"chaniarts" wrote in message
...


Well... That's really what the overdrive is for. Not below 30mph (I
think most cars kick them in around 50-55mph), but to reduce engine
RPM at high speed. And actually many engines are supposed to be most
efficient running around 3/4 throttle.

Puckdropper

3/4 throttle without specifying the gear doesn't mean anything. 3/4 throttle
in overdrive gear in my car is probably 130mph, which probably isn't it's
most fuel efficient.

The transmission gear is irrelevant when specifying engine efficiency. The
engine is more efficient at a throttle plate opening of 1/2 to 3/4. Below this
opening the pumping losses around the plate go way up. Above this and
the mixture gets richer on carbureted engines, FI may be different.

Back in the 70's one of the car mags ran an article on a BMW study of
the most efficient acceleration method. The end result was to accelerate
at 1/2 throttle opening up to 2,000 rpm and upshift. This is repeated until the
desired speed is reached then use the highest gear, without lugging the
engine, and the appropriate throttle opening. Their data showed that small
throttle openings caused low efficiency, and mpg, due to the high pumping
losses. Long sloooow acceleration times were almost as bad a jack rabbit
start.
Art

(Edward A. Falk) wrote in
:

In article
, cmagers
wrote:

".." wrote in message

groups.com.. .
hard
braking) wastes gas.


Never seen gas powered brakes.

Every joule of heat energy dissipated by the brakes
represents wasted energy that originally came from
gasoline. A better approach is to take your foot off the
gas as you approach a stop.

In a sense, hard braking doesn't waste gas -- it's an
indicator that you've *already* wasted the gas.


Actually that is only partially true. Some cars, especially
hybrids, sense deceleration and charge the battery at full
output. It saves brake wear and it saves the gas you would
have spent charging the battery had you slowed the vehicle at
a more casual pace. Most if not all newer cars completely shut
off fuel when decelerating.

It's been a while since I was in that industry but they were
doing that as far back as late 80's. I can only assume with
the proliferation of electronics it has made it more feasible
at a lower cost.

Larry

"Artemus" wrote in
:


"chaniarts" wrote in message
...


Well... That's really what the overdrive is for. Not below 30mph
(I think most cars kick them in around 50-55mph), but to reduce
engine RPM at high speed. And actually many engines are supposed
to be most efficient running around 3/4 throttle.

Puckdropper

3/4 throttle without specifying the gear doesn't mean anything. 3/4
throttle in overdrive gear in my car is probably 130mph, which
probably isn't it's most fuel efficient.

The transmission gear is irrelevant when specifying engine efficiency.
The engine is more efficient at a throttle plate opening of 1/2 to
3/4. Below this opening the pumping losses around the plate go way
up. Above this and the mixture gets richer on carbureted engines, FI
may be different.

Back in the 70's one of the car mags ran an article on a BMW study of
the most efficient acceleration method. The end result was to
accelerate at 1/2 throttle opening up to 2,000 rpm and upshift. This
is repeated until the desired speed is reached then use the highest
gear, without lugging the engine, and the appropriate throttle
opening. Their data showed that small throttle openings caused low
efficiency, and mpg, due to the high pumping losses. Long sloooow
acceleration times were almost as bad a jack rabbit start.
Art



This has generated bit of research for me. The Wikipedia article on
Engine Efficiency says 3/4 horsepower rating (and not 3/4 throttle) would
be most efficient, while the Prius article says that the Prius runs the
engine with the throttle fully open as much as possible to minimize
pumping losses.

In a simple system like a hydraulic powered mower, 3/4 throttle could
equal 3/4 horsepower output. In something more complex, 3/4 throttle may
not be able to produce the 3/4 horsepower output.

However, the Wikipedia article on Engine Efficiency could be wrong about
3/4 rated horspower output. That particilar article was rather poorly
written and doesn't cite its sources.

Puckdropper
--
Never teach your apprentice everything you know.

Artemus wrote:

The transmission gear is irrelevant when specifying engine
efficiency. The engine is more efficient at a throttle plate opening
of 1/2 to 3/4. Below this opening the pumping losses around the
plate go way up. Above this and
the mixture gets richer on carbureted engines, FI may be different.

Fuel injection is indeed much different.


Back in the 70's one of the car mags ran an article on a BMW study of
the most efficient acceleration method. The end result was to
accelerate
at 1/2 throttle opening up to 2,000 rpm and upshift. This is
repeated until the desired speed is reached then use the highest
gear, without lugging the
engine, and the appropriate throttle opening. Their data showed that
small throttle openings caused low efficiency, and mpg, due to the
high pumping losses. Long sloooow acceleration times were almost as
bad a jack rabbit start.

A lot has changed since then. Even then, that study was limited in scope
since it did not consider all of the various engines out there at the time.
Today, there are a lot more small DOHC engines out there that run at 6K in
order to hit their torque curve, and lot less pushrod v-8's which deliver
torque just about off an idle. Not to mention that everything is fuel
injected today and nobody manufactures a production carburated engine.

About the only thing that hasn't changed is that nobody likes to get stuck
behind that guy that believes it's better to accelerate slooooooooly....

--

-Mike-

"Mike Marlow" wrote in message
...

A lot has changed since then. Even then, that study was limited in scope
since it did not consider all of the various engines out there at the time.
Today, there are a lot more small DOHC engines out there that run at 6K in
order to hit their torque curve, and lot less pushrod v-8's which deliver
torque just about off an idle. Not to mention that everything is fuel
injected today and nobody manufactures a production carburated engine.

About the only thing that hasn't changed is that nobody likes to get stuck
behind that guy that believes it's better to accelerate slooooooooly....

Your post got my brain cell (yes, sometimes it seems there's only one)
going. A few months back I saw a Top Gear episode where they took an
econobox and matched it against a big V8 (BMW? Audi?) on a track.
The V8 just followed as the econobox did it's best to achieve low lap
times with it's engine screaming at high rpms. The V8 just loafed along
in a high gear with the engine turning low rpms. They didn't say but I
assume the V8's throttle opening was well above idle and therefore
pumping losses would be low.
The result was that the V8 had better fuel economy than the econobox.
This is obviously a contrived situation to demonstrate just that result but
it is interesting in that it shows the small, high rpm engine isn't always the
winner in the economy race.
Art

Mike Marlow wrote:

Artemus wrote:

The transmission gear is irrelevant when specifying engine
efficiency. The engine is more efficient at a throttle plate opening
of 1/2 to 3/4. Below this opening the pumping losses around the
plate go way up. Above this and
the mixture gets richer on carbureted engines, FI may be different.

Fuel injection is indeed much different.


Back in the 70's one of the car mags ran an article on a BMW study of
the most efficient acceleration method. The end result was to
accelerate
at 1/2 throttle opening up to 2,000 rpm and upshift. This is
repeated until the desired speed is reached then use the highest
gear, without lugging the
engine, and the appropriate throttle opening. Their data showed that
small throttle openings caused low efficiency, and mpg, due to the
high pumping losses. Long sloooow acceleration times were almost as
bad a jack rabbit start.

A lot has changed since then. Even then, that study was limited in scope
since it did not consider all of the various engines out there at the
time. Today, there are a lot more small DOHC engines out there that run at
6K in order to hit their torque curve, and lot less pushrod v-8's which
deliver
torque just about off an idle. Not to mention that everything is fuel
injected today and nobody manufactures a production carburated engine.

About the only thing that hasn't changed is that nobody likes to get stuck
behind that guy that believes it's better to accelerate slooooooooly....


Or use the engine to brake for the red light ahead -- starting 1 block
before the red light.

.... after he accelerated sloooooowly after the last light turned green.



--

There is never a situation where having more rounds is a disadvantage

Rob Leatham

... wrote:
Driving and Car Maintenance: Transportation accounts for 66% of U.S.
oil use -mainly in the form of gasoline. Luckily, there are plenty of
ways to improve gas mileage.


[...]

Excellent ideas.

Conserving fuel keeps the price down for the rest of us who don't give a fig
about saving either fuel or the environment.

Everytime I see a fool commuting to work on a bicycle in a business suit, I
think to myself "There's another penny a gallon saved!"