Fifty-Three and Forty

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First Tank of Gas: $18.00 ($1.339/gal, 1 May 03)
First MPG: 26.333

Last Tank of Gas: $53.00 ($3.739/gal, 20 May 08)
Last MPG: 40.635


Zim: 2003 Mazda Protege 5 door wagon, 2.0L, 5 speed manual
EPA Rated: 22 City / 28 Highway (source)


My next trick will be the 600 mile tank of gas. Last one was 576.


Yeah, I do weird shit in the name of fuel economy, but I'm spending five times as much per month on unleaded as I was when I bought Zim ($100/mo now, $20/mo then) thanks to tripling fuel prices and a commute that's fifteen times longer.

Comments

[onceupon.livejournal.com]

Soooooo, what do you do in the name of fuel economy?

[etcet.livejournal.com]

The easiest, no-brainer-est things you can do are:
- Make sure your tires are properly inflated (if they say "45-50psi," on the sidewall put 50psi in 'em! Firmer tires roll with less resistance, and have a fractionally larger circumference. Properly inflated tires also wear more evenly and provide better grip.
- Invest in a good air filter (K&N's oiled cloth ones, for instance); this is good for about 5-10% better fuel economy and a bit more horsepower. With gas as expensive as it is now, $30 for one of these, as opposed to a $6 paper filter with every oil change, pays for itself very quickly.
- Slow down. Just by dropping from 70 to 60 on the freeway portions of my morning commute, it adds up, and only increases drive time by a couple minutes. And who wants to get to *work* faster? ;-)


More extreme measures:
- Turn the car off at red lights, especially if you roll up just as it's turned red. If you're going to be sitting still, why burn gas at all? Fuel-injected engines' break-even point, fuel-consumption-wise for a warm start vs. idling is about 15 seconds.


Shit I do that freaks out passengers:
- Coast. A lot. Since I drive stick, and know the signals on my commute really well, I know when I can just drop into neutral and shut the engine off to coast up to a light that will be red when I get there, without unduly fucking with the flow of traffic around me. If I'm coasting at 20 when the light turns green, I can just drop back into gear, let off the clutch, and continue merrily on my way.

Here's the Google on Hypermiling for a pile o' links, including a wikipedia entry.

[megiddo-lj.livejournal.com]

Thank God I mostly just park Fry on the street and walk everywhere because it's EIGHTY GODDAMN DOLLARS to fill up the Jeep here. I average 19mpg. Of course, I haven't driven since last..erm..Friday? and I'll only be making the trek to the store today, which is about 3 or 4 miles each way. A tank of gas lasts me several weeks.

[etcet.livejournal.com]

That's a lot of it - in NoLa, my commute was a mile and a half each way. It's 24 now (it was 8 at Coke). Part of why I'm looking forward to changing offices when this building is sold is that it'll cut about 8 miles of non-highway driving off my commute, which means an extra ten or fifteen minutes of sleep on top of all the other convenience benefits.

I'll just be losing the ability to walk across the street to get lunch, depending on what sort of stuff is being built in the "office subdivision" now.

[kendra-manycats.livejournal.com]

I opted to hold off on buying a Hybrid a few years ago. I wanted to wait and see how the engineering held up under real world conditions. Probably not the best idea in hindsight.

So now I'm coasting a lot in my commutes. I've also dropped my speed and thankfully no one gets homicidal in Wisconsin about my lower speed.

I'm researching my next vehicle but I won't be able to get a new one until next year at the earliers. Keith's gonna need a new car w/ his 400 mile weekly commute.