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Best Gas Mileage - Five Random Fuel Saving Tips
First of all
With gasoline prices starting to head up once again all over the US, this theme becomes burning hot in United States, too. Finally Americans linked up with the rest of the Earth in a desire to save a little gasoline. Here are a few tips from the once car engine designer that may help you to protect your wallet a tad.
- Try to keep things in perspective. Remember that your aim is to pay not as much of cash overall. Spending $1000 on a tune-up with potential saving of $1 per tank is not rational. This is not to say you should not do a regular maintenance at all. If time comes, certainly go ahead and do it. Regular maintenance is important to your vehicle wellness, including its fuel economy. However from the saving outlook you are to carry out the least pricey (zero cost ideally) measures that give you top economy.
- In a hot weather, turn off air conditioner and open windows while driving in the city if practical, and close windows and turn on air conditioner on highways. At higher speeds (around 50 MPH and up) windage becomes a highest fuel consumer, at lower speeds air conditioner eats more;
And even more...
- If you drive an auto, use overdrive. If you drive a stick shift, use your gears. Your goal is to drive in the highest gear, but without overloading your engine;
- If you have several vehicles, use the one with the best gas mileage for daily commute;
- Plan your route to keep away from traffic jams. You cannot keep away from excessive idling, braking and speeding up while in a traffic jam, so jams are to blame for a big chunk of gasoline used up. You can keep away from jams sometimes if you discover traffic patterns in your area and use them to your benefit;
- Do not store in the vehicle anything you do not absolutely need. Inspect your luggage compartment, glove box, and passenger compartment for possessions that do not have any business being in the vehicle on a permanent basis. This does not save you too much (unless you have a habit of driving with the full trunk) - but it saves something, and it does not cost anything to realize.
As you can imagine, this is just a teaser, and I have a really comprehensive list of true and false tips to get best gas mileage, including my humble opinion on gas savers on my site...
Take a look at my other hubs
Hate my hub? Let me know! Please vote if you like it, though :)
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Yep, it's all covered with bruises LOL. And no, I am not into robocops, soory :)
You got me on the cvt. But guess what. As that centrifical band or whatever travels up that conical shaft it becomes overdriven. LOL. We have beat this dead horse. On to bigger and better things. By the way did you read my RoboCop deal?
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John, I swear my only auto does not have overdrive. And cannot really - it's CVT. :)
As for the manual transmission - again, I definitely can be behind American terminology, and I am positive it is called a different word in Russian. I suspect Chinese, Hebrew or French could be different, too :)
Every vehicle today has an overdrive gear. Some have 2 overdrive gears. All it means is just what I said, about gear ratios. Just as an example if you look at rear end gear ratios like 3.73. That means that the driving(or pinion in this case) gear turns 3.73 times while the gear that it is driving (ring gear) turns 1 time. An overdrive is the opposite, having something like .84 to 1. saying that the driving gear turns .84 to every 1 turn of the driven gear. I'm dragging on, but here's a link to explain it nicely. I wouldn't think it's limited to american terminology.
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Hi John,
Thanks for stopping by :)
Well, I drive mostly manual cars, but the only auto I have does not have overdrive. Yet I remember it on older cars. And I was talking about overdrive in relation to automatic transmission. Hence my assumption that they don't do overdrive anymore - may be erroneous, that's why I put "probably" there. :)
As for manual cars, I never called the fifth overdrive - while technically it is usually exactly as you said, so may be I am missing an American terminology here. :)
Sorry, I was reading through the comments. Why is overdrive an outdated term? A gear that has more teeth than the gear that it is driving is an overdriven gear. Now obviously with an automatic trans there is only a planetary gearset, but you get my point. Lookin forward to reading some more of your stuff Misha. I always like dealin with people who actually have an opinion.
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Thanks for stopping by Andrianna - and my pleasure becoming your fan :)
Yes, mapping your trip definitely helps to avoid some extra miles :)
First: thanks for becoming MY fan!
Second: Map your trips before taking Off! I live in a rural area of the US and it's a minimum 30mi in any direction. I have a very economical vehicle(30 mi/gal), but what used to cost me $60/mo, a yr & 1/2 ago turned into $200/mo 8mos ago. Slightly better in the past few months, but You're right...price/gal gas is beginning to creep back up. So America...Wake up! It's far from being stablized.
Great Hub!
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Thanks for stopping by Cap, and for fanning too :)
great hub. I join your fan clib mishsa
thank you
solar cap;t
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I would say it is more of a safety problem, than fuel mileage one :)
'dragging through the air' hey that reminds me, should owners think twice about rolling the window down to keep their dogs heads inside? lol. A friend of mine has two! on either side!
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LOL Thanks for stopping by girls :)
Yeah LG, absolutely! Actually you can find those and 30 more on my own site, which is linked in the hub :)
Sure Louisa, if you don't use it, you are just wasting money dragging it through the air around :)
Sounds like its time to take the roof rack off! Great easy tips.
A couple of extra things - firstly, don't buy a tank which does 3 miles to the gallon. A decent medium-sized car will easily get an average of 40 mpg.
Secondly, drive less! Walk, take the train, cycle...
LOL McLean! This is gonna be your new name Misha! :P
Oh, thanks McLean. How generous of you to share those tips. Great hub! :) nicely done.
Here is one I have not seen anywhere for just saving money on gas - you may think it's kindof *wrong* but oh well...I do NOT see it as any sort of *moral* type issue.
If you have native friends in Canada - get them to fill up your vehicle because they pay a whole lot less for gas on the reserves than we do because they do NOT pay the tax!! It is utterly AMAZING how much you SAVE!!!
If you WANT to - you can then take the both of you to supper at a nice restaurant with all the extra money! NO, I am NOT kidding.
Melanie
In today's economy, this is definatelya good hub to take a look at. Thanks for the post.
I knew about the AC and extra luggage consuming fuel. But the other tips are great. Very useful hub.
Thanks for the tips. However, AC in the South is essential, so I will not save gasoline on that tip! ;-)
I must inform you that you left out two basic and easy ways to improve your efficiency. Being an avid science and movie fan, I observed that Mad Max had attatched a sail to one of his deathmobiles and was able to power his vehicle across the salt flats using only air power. The historian in me looks to our ancestors for guidence and I can ot recall Fred Flintstone ever running out of gas. Perhaps Cutting a hole in the floorboards of my Expedidtion would allow me to utilize some good old fashioned footbower to get the mighty monster moving , at which time my feet can withdraw from the pavement and the internal combustion may take over. Just a few ideas. Happy Earth Day
Nice tips! My former car had a stick-shift and no a/c...as you can imagine it got great mileage. :) I'll try the overdrive tip with my current car. Thanks!
Absolutely perfect tips Misha, especially optimal using of Air Conditioner is appreciated. None of us really take care of this parameter for saving gas. In fact I personally use this with my car. Thanx!
I'm thinking of going to the bio deisel switch myself
Great suggestions Misha! For people who have to live far away from work, these are especially useful. With gas prices the way they are, next time people move, they should just consider a more expensive home that is closer to work.
Great tips!
Fuel prices are getting rediculas in the UK. I walk now if I can manage to carry the shopping, not always easy with a big family to feed so I have to do a bit most days!
Driving from Oakland to San Francisco I'm sure I can save a fortune in gas simply by rolling down the window and killing the AC. Good hub!
Oh! this is it, ah! I 've been wondering for so long what happens to those gallons of fuel i pore into my tank, now i know, i am doing exactly the opposite of what you blogged. You could have posted it as how to earn money by reducing your fuel consumption hahaaha, because if you come to net you can only see online money, how to earn money, etc, ;-) any way its a very good information thanx a lot Misha.
Great hub Misha! Look forward to checking out the other tips on your site. ;-)
Great tips Misha. I will have to try these out. Gas prices have certainly been getting crazy lately...
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Hi Andi,
Thanks a lot! Yeah, sure you can link to it from any place you want, and I will greatly appreciate it!
And thanks for the idea of social buttons - I did not think about it for some reason. It will take some work, so I'm putting it into my improvements queue.
In Canada (where I am) the gas is much more expensive than in U.S , so it's more important to know how to save gas. Very good tips. I read the full version on your site, I really like it. I wanted to bookmark it to my favorite social bookmarking sites such as digg, stumbleupon, but I didn't see any buttons at the end of your article. Can I link it to my Chinese blog? Thanks.
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Thanks, guys :)
Jonathan, yeah, I'm pretty much sure you save both on gas and breaks this way :)
Another good fuel saving tip is not tailgating. Tailgating is rampant. I commute an hour everyday to work and everyone does this. I see the drivers' break lights in front of me going on and off, on and off. They accelerate (using fuel) and then break to avoid hitting the car right in front of them (wasting all the fuel they just used to accelerate. I stay around 3 to 4 seconds behind the car in front of me and can avoid using my break for a whole hour or more just by remaining constantly aware of what the car in front of me is doing. I guess I must be saving quite a bit in fuel costs and my breaks aren't taking a beating either.
Jonathan
I've just seen your hub, nice and useful for those who wish to save on gas :) Congrats.
nice
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Rapidwriter, I'm glad I could be of any help :)
Whitney, if you follow the link at the end of text to the full article on my site, you'll find this and a bunch of other tips, total of 33 - shameless self-promotion :P
How about those electric scooters or mini-bikes. Or just walk. ha
Great tips, Misha. I've given up on trying to drive but both my son and my daughter are learning, so I'll pass on your tips. Very useful.
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Thanks guys :)
manoharv, you are absolutely right, I mentioned this already somewhere in the comments
Abhinaya, thanks for your kind word. They are encouraging and inspiring :) And the tips are random for real - they are picked randomly from the list of 33 tips I have on my site :D
No one is going to hate your hub Misha.These are great tips.And they are not random but step by step instructions to novice drivers like me.Thanks for the great hub.Thumbs up!
Overdrive is probably an outdated term now.
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Thanks Catawn :)
Some people do, some don't, some know this already... Pretty much like with any advice :)
Some good tips... I just avoid it all and take public transit. :D Hopefully people will listen to this sort of advice, though.
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Thanks multimastery, I hope you find something usefull there :)
Thanks for the tips, I bookmarked your website.
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Thanks Ralph,
And yes Lissie, this was a really smart move I think!
Best thing we ever did was replace the 2nd car with a scooter - $5 for a whole week's commuting !
Good advice.
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Merrymarry, you are welcome :)
Eileen, yeah, natural gas is still cheaper in many places. But the more people are going to catch up with this, the sooner natural gas is going to cost you about the same per mile or kilometer you drive... Considering the costs of extra equipment, it does not look like a viable proposition to me nowadays...
Great tips we sure need to conserve our fuel these days. Our car was converted to gas several years ago and we have just put our deisel nissan on dgas to get that extra bit of power. But the way the prices on gas are going up it is not helping us much.
point #2 is definitely a new knowledge to me, thanks!
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Angela, the more active your driving style is, the more it will help :)
MrMarmalade, thanks. I think the only way to get rid of fear of driving is to drive more...
SageSeer, thanks for taking time to visit my website :) I think it's a smart move with your backseats... and one-vehicle household... I can't imagine myself doing this now... But I remember the times when mine was no-vehicle household, though :)
Love yousuggestions and will set aside time to look through our website. We are experimenting with bieng a one vehicle household and, so far, we have managed. Since we need to have a vehicle with room for large items, we have a Pontiac Transport 1991....the one htat looks like a dust buster. It's totally paid for and has removeable seats in the back, so you know where those extra passenger seats stay?
In the garage!
I hate driving. I drive to get from point a-B. Still prewfer driving to bussing and training. I like your comments and will endeavour to put into practice.
Great tips. I really need to take all of the junk out of my car. You would think I was a delivery driver with all of the stuff in it. I blame my kids! ;-)
I have voted. Enjoy.
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Thanks a bunch guys :)
Glassvisage,
Overdrive is probably an outdated term now. Just keep your selector in drive and don't put it into 1 or 2 unless absolutely necessary
I'll pass this on to my husband...He is the driver at home. Me? I just go around on my bicycle, that certainly saves me petrol and helps me to be able to taste plenty of cheese and cakes without adding on the kilos !!!
Very useful tips, thanks so much for this hub of yours. I like your other site about driving, and your Squidoo, too.
I love your site. I don't have a car yet, but I will save the information for when I do get it.
Great tips for stopping those fat cats from getting even fatter charging over the top prices for fuel!!
Misha, Good for you! I love bicycles, too.
I wish I knew what overdrive is -_-*
Really good tips. But I'm afraid I don't take advantage of many of your good ideas.
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Thanks guys :D
@Kenny
I'm thinking more about bicycles nowadays :)
@Friday
I bet she will :D
Great info here and on your website, thanks! By the way, that's one smart girl ... she's going to get SOMEONE ELSE to pay for her fuel.
Great tips, and I think it's better if we all plan to have good electric cars on our roads tomorrow.
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You now I love girls :D
As for the car - I guess it's a Trabant - you wouldn't know, you are too young ;)
Hahahaha.. I love that its a GIRL with a broke-down car, not knowing how to fix it. ;) That's probably an old Skoda. ;) Good hub, good tips!
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