Hypermiling

l0l0l0l on 20/04/2013 - 21:15

Anyone here have any experiences with hypermiling. Pretty much maximising fuel economy via various conventional and not so conventional techniques. I never realised there was an official term for it. Anyway I try and hypermile safely as much as possible, and not impeding those behind me. Main techniques I use is coasting to the lights, keeping momemtum before light changes, and always aiming to keep moving in light/medium traffic never stopping completely.

On another note I saw a guy on his bike on the way to uni today. He was drafting behind a huge truck maybe was 3m behind him at 60-70kph. He seemed to be effortlessly pedalling because the truck was tanking all the air resistance. I mean sure he's using less kilojoules doing that but seriously disregards his safety. Oh well Darwins theory will eventually prevail.

This wikipedia article seems interesting, wow they even have competitions for it! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy-efficient_driving

General Discussion

Comments

  • _Bruce_ on 21/04/2013 - 09:33
    +2

    Bike riders also frequently run red lights for this reason. My approach is to coast in where reasonable, but much beyond that becomes unsafe and/or inconsiderate.

  • cannedhams on 21/04/2013 - 13:44
    +1

    When i rode a bike seriously i used to draft the milk truck every morning, he would be going at about 60 ks so he would pull away eventually. Also he hated me doing it so he used to brake and accelerate suddenly to try and shake me off.

    The problem with slipstreaming in a car is that in real world terms you have to constantly feather the throttle in order to stay the appropriate distance away from the truck in front. This uses fuel.

    The other problem is that driving up the highway you are often driving in an easterly seabreeze crosswind. This means that the draft of the car in front is actually blown sideways, so you wont get as much of a drafting effect. In road biking terms this is a deliberate strategy called "throwing it in the gutter". I once drove down the gold coast without trying to draft any trucks and was surprised that it had not much effect on fuel consumption.

    Mythbusters did a test of how much slipstreaming saved fuel, and found that it saved quite a bit but this was in ideal conditions where the car in front was sticking to a set speed.

    I find that driving at 80 ks rather than a hundred has a significant bearing on fuel as well as tyre pressure. Having a manual transmission rather tha auto helps too.

  • 2ndeffort on 22/04/2013 - 01:37

    My VW Passat turns the engine off automatically when you stop in traffic or at the lights. It then turns it on again automatically when you take your foot off the brake. I guess in cars that dont have the auto facility you could switch on/off manually!

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