Drive to maximize your fuel economy!
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Article Date: Fri, July 25, 2008
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Thursday, July 17, 2008
Drive to maximize your fuel economy
How changing the way you drive can help increase your fuel economy.
Here are some small changes you can make to your driving habits to help conserve gas.
Making lots of short trips means you’re driving with your engine cold. And that uses more fuel than making one long trip with an engine that’s warmed up. Try combining your short trips around town as much as possible to optimize your fuel economy.
Aggressive driving (speeding, rapid acceleration and braking) wastes gas. It can lower your gas mileage by 33 percent at highway speeds and by 5 percent around town. Sensible driving is also safer for you and others, so you may save more than just gas money.
While each vehicle reaches its optimal fuel economy at a different speed (or range of speeds), gas mileage usually decreases rapidly at speeds above 60 mph.
Avoid keeping unnecessary items in your vehicle, especially heavy ones. An extra 100 pounds in your vehicle could reduce your miles per gallon (mpg) by up to 2%. The reduction is based on the percentage of extra weight relative to the vehicle's weight and affects smaller vehicles more than larger ones.
Idling gets 0 mpg. Cars with larger engines typically waste more gas at idle than do cars with smaller engines. If you know you’ll be stopped for a while, it’s actually better to turn off your engine instead of idling.
Using cruise control on the highway helps you maintain a constant speed and, in most cases, will save gas.
When you use overdrive gearing, your car's engine speed goes down. This saves gas and reduces engine wear.
Source: www.fueleconomy.gov |
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