Here is a side of the world that no one in a Hummer could ever dream of - it is called hypermiling. They reckon that the sport came about born out of countless Internet bulletin boards that serve the car enthusiast community. You've known of the gaming communities online that can't stop talking about how they've overclocked their computers with some crazy cooling devices and achieved unimaginable speeds and performance on one game or another haven't you? Consider the hypermiling online community to be something like those gamers, except that these people do something really productive - they try to understand everything about an internal combustion vehicle that will help them squeeze miles out of every drop of fuel they have. If you haven't ever seen one of these websites or bulletin boards, try CleanMPG.com. You will regularly get to see claims of crazy techniques that allow these innovative car enthusiasts to take their cars out more than 80 miles to a gallon of gas. The Honda Insight Marathon in Oklahoma a few years ago had the champions do 200 miles on a about 13 gallons of gas. We're always thinking of getting better gas mileage out of our cars; could we ever do anything like this? Could we ever get even 50 miles to the gallon?
Why is it that we don't ever get anything like that out of our cars? Well, some of the things they do include turning the car engine off when there is a slight slope in the road, blocking off the front air vents for better aerodynamics, removing as much weight from the car (and that includes soft seats) to go easier on the engine, and so on. Could they do it on regular cars such as you and I have? They couldn't go that far, but 50 mpg could be within reach - with techniques regular people could use. Let's look at some of the best techniques they use for better gas mileage
1. Use the brakes as infrequently as possible. When you see a red light, take your foot off the gas and coast to the red light. If you do this correctly, you'll reach the signal just as it turns green. You can use the momentum to accelerate again. If you have a daily commute, you should try to learn how to time it so that you'll catch all lights when they are green.
2. Car engines need to warm up before they'll achieve their most efficient levels (it's called closed loop operation). You could buy an engine block heater to get the warming up done quickly and artificially to save on gas.
3. Trimming the weight off your car will help you with better gas mileage. The way the formula goes, for every 30 pounds of weight you lose (or that your car loses), you will save something like a tenth of a percentage point. If your trunk is filled with stuff that you're just putting off clearing out, you need to get on it right away.
4. Explosive starts from traffic signals can make you look really cool; but for better gas mileage, it's suicide. You get the best efficiency at low engine turns; it might seem really slow, but if you let the other people get ahead of you to the next traffic stop, their presence can turn the lights green by the time you roll in. And it looks really cool when everyone rushes past you only to cool their heels while you saunter in with no more speed than necessary.
5. Everyone knows that tire pressure gets you points with better gas mileage. But how about engine lubrication? That's an area that gets passed over all the time. Synthetic engine oil is longer life than the regular stuff. You'll get better engine performance for longer with it.
You just need to persuade yourself to change a few habits and get with a few simple rules like this, and pretty soon you should be on your way to ambitiously better gas mileage.
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