Hyper-miling is a set of driving techniques and tricks to help get the most mileage out of a tank of gas. Basically, it comes down to getting into good driving habits. An easy one is this: don't let the act of driving and/or being stuck in traffic make you crazy!! Bad feul-efficiency goes hand in hand with bad attitudes, bad tempers and agressive driving in general. Calm down at the wheel and you'll save money at the pump! Here's a few a the major contributers to bad fuel-ecomnomy are that we can all fix just by being a bit more mindful. Starting fast from a dead stop... We've all done it. Your sitting at a red light and as soon as it turns green, you accelarate way faster than you need to, often just to stop at the next red-light up ahead! Whether you're in a bad mood or had a bad day or you're just prone to getting agressive or competitive at the wheel, slaming on the accelarator from a dead-stop is one of the worst habits for feul-economy. When taking off from a red-light or stop sign, don't floor it but gradually allow the car to get up to speed. Coast to a stop... When you see a red light coming up from far away, let go of the gas and/or put it in neutral and coast to a stop instead of keeping your foot on the gas and breaking to stop abruptly at the light. You should do this in bumper-to-bumper highway traffic too, when you see the car five cars ahead applying the brakes, let your foot off the gas and start coasting to a stop instead of speeding to that same, inevitable stop. Coasting to a stop is a good-habit will also save you money in brake tune-ups and wear and tear. Coast down hills... This works especially well when highway driving. When headed down-hill, let your foot of the gas and put the car in neutral and coast down using your brakes to control your speed. You can do this even if your car has an automatic transmission. In neutral, the engine will only be idling (around 500-1000 rpms) instead of reving at an unnecessarily high rpm (3000-4000) and thereby wasting gas. Turn it off... When you park your car, always turn the engine off unless you know you'll be stopped for less than 20 seconds. It's a common myth that the surge of power needed to start an engine consumes way more gas than letting it idle. That's true... only if you're stopped for LESS than 20 seconds, otherwise, like if you're stopped for 25 seconds, then turning your engine off is better. A good habit to get into is always turning off the ignition when you park, because really, count to 20 right now... how often are you parked for that short of a time? Keep a clean car... if you keep the outside of your car clean and waxed, it lets the car slip more easily through the air and can increase your feul efficiency by 4-7% (This percentage comes from a study that compared a cleaned, waxed car to a filthy, muddy car ). I you really want to get into hyper-miling, there are more in-depth techniques to try. As I understand one technique, you should pump the gas pedal to get up to desired speed and then let go of the gas and coast 20 or 30 kph less than your desired speed then start pumping again. I've tried this but must admit that I can't confirm if it works because between my leg's glutes and ham-strings seazing up and my wife complaining of a sore neck, I couldn't get enough tangible evidence to endorse this practice. |