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Save £800 a year on petrol...Guardian article.
Comments
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skiddlydiddly wrote: »A basic tip is use the lowest amount of revs in the highest gear possible without labouring the engine.If you are getting excessive judder in the pedal you're in too high a gear.If you are having to apply a lot of throttle on hills to maintain speed then its probably better to gear down, you may have higher revs but will be using less fuel.
You just have to think about what you are doing and put your ego to one side and realise most of us can improve quite a lot.Once you get into the habit it becomes second nature.
BTW an added bonus is that it also can save on other components like brakes-I barely brake now in comparison to before and do significantly less gearchanges so less wear on the clutch and drivetrain. If you do big miles this will affect you even more.
This is the way I look at it - I dont really try to get into the highest gear, I select the gear that requires the minimum amount of throttle.
My car has one of these indicators that tells you which gear to select for maximum economy. More often than not it tries to tell you to select 6th even at very slow speeds. I can achieve significantly better economy using the above method and I have now switched the gear indication off.0 -
i got a big sprinter lpg conversion that does about 30-35 mpg but although i save on lpg use, i waste my energy on the gas station, .... it takes 20 minutes to fill it with 100 litres of gas!!! i can see other costumers, comming, filling, !!!!ing, going.. and i still pressing the button there to release more lpg for my van
its ok now as sort of warm, but think in winter!
then i got a honda hornet 2002 bike-- ashame of it mpg-- same as the van!! but then again the bike is the fastest thing in london, unless you are richard branson and own a helicopter
then we got a mini diesel... when we went to europe last summer,...750 miles per 47 pounds of diesel...top mini !0 -
The best economy is not always from immediately logical methods, such as keeping revs low or not stressing the engine.
e.g. I have achieved my best results in one car by accelerating quickly and revving the engine hard. Accelerate using the point where the engine is developing the most power for the least fuel used, which could well be 4,500 RPM on a revvy petrol v6. This feels bizarre but is appropriate for some engines.
I've also driven using minimal throttle - the old 'imagine there's an egg under the pedal'. In one petrol car this consistently returned lower economy than my usual driving but worked quite well in a big diesel!
Basically you have to measure the results or you don't know.0 -
thescouselander wrote: »This is the way I look at it - I dont really try to get into the highest gear, I select the gear that requires the minimum amount of throttle.
My car has one of these indicators that tells you which gear to select for maximum economy. More often than not it tries to tell you to select 6th even at very slow speeds. I can achieve significantly better economy using the above method and I have now switched the gear indication off.
We're saying the same thing, just differently.I don't mean always drive in top gear, I mean use the highest that is possible without labouring the engine.That might be 6th on one road and 4th on another.
Also, for turbo powered petrol cars keeping the car off boost saves a ton of fuel.When you accelerate hard the ecu will pour an absolute ton of fuel into the engine to meet the demands of the air entering.If you gradually accelerate the car will barely boost and significantly less petrol will be used.To give you an example I have a 4wd 2l turbo car(not daily driver)and driving like a nun it would do 25 mpg on a run.Take it on a track where it was constantly on boost and revving and it fell to sub 5mpg.0 -
skiddlydiddly wrote: »
Also, for turbo powered petrol cars keeping the car off boost saves a ton of fuel.When you accelerate hard the ecu will pour an absolute ton of fuel into the engine to meet the demands of the air entering.If you gradually accelerate the car will barely boost and significantly less petrol will be used.To give you an example I have a 4wd 2l turbo car(not daily driver)and driving like a nun it would do 25 mpg on a run.Take it on a track where it was constantly on boost and revving and it fell to sub 5mpg.
Definately concur.
A lot to do with turbos being naturally inefficient ways of increasing power. They use energy from the engine (backing up the exhaust gases) to compress the air. That heats the air which then has to cooled again through an intercooler to get large power increases. Greta fun but bl**dy inefficient0 -
There is no legal compulsion to drive up to the speed limit..whatever it is....
As for creating a so-called 'delay' to following traffic?
what is more important to you, the driver?
Your wallet?
Or the other drivers' egos?Happy chappy0 -
tomstickland wrote: »There's no way I can drive at 20mph over speed bumps. I have to slow to around 5-6mph. I'd rather spend the money on fuel than replacing suspension components.
Wow, the traffic calming must be pretty severe in Stroud! There are different types of speed humps: flat-topped, round-topped and of course heights vary within a certain range; all of which will make a difference to comfortable speeds.
What I thought was most significant in the article was that 80mph can use up to 25% more fuel than at 70mph. That's a big difference!
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My car has new suspension so it doesn't wobble and wallow, but taking a speed bump at 20mph would be showing no mechanical sympathy at all.
Drag forces scale with speed squaured. Power requirement scales with speed cubed, but you spend less time travelling at the higher speed. So amount of work done scales with speed squared.
Hence a 15% increase in speed gives around a 25-30% increase in fuel consumption.Happy chappy0
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