100+ hypermiling / ecodriving tips & tactics

[Daox]

I also mean no disrespect. But, the above is a great post as an example of common ignorance. Thank you for your time put in to registering to demonstrate this.

[groar]

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

In my opinion, and by no means do I mean any disrespect, I think that almost the entirety of this list is BS.

Good job! First post and you trash all the work other made during years.

Except that one point you dislikes (stop&start engine instead of being idle), which points do you like ? which ones are you using ?which ones will you use ?

Personally I like the idea to stop the engine while coasting.
I will never stop my engine while coasting because my cars have not been conceived to work this way.
Until now I'm using DWB, moderate accelerations and quick gear shift up.

With that my last tank is at 36% over EPA and 42% over what I was doing before eco-driving.

About you comment

If you cannot afford the gas, DON'T BUY A CAR!!!!!

:thumbdown:

Thanks in advance,

Denis.

[jonr]

Turning off the engine is a legitimate fuel saver; I was working for Ford when they were testing it.

[MetroMPG]

bimmerguy, your "opinion" is squarely at odds with the major automakers which are all rolling out auto stop/start systems (including BMW with its "efficient dynamics" technology). You need to do a bit more research.

The fact is that shutting down the engine while stopped nets significant fuel savings, which negates your points 1 & 2, which is why it is appearing on more and more cars as standard equipment.

As for your point 3, not enough oil drains down in the course of a few seconds or minutes to matter in terms of wear. The line you hear about starting an engine being hard on it refers to a cold soak start, not a warm one.

[bimmerguy]

my information comes from an auto mechanic of over 30 years. I don't use any of the hipermiling techniques, I think the idea is rediculous. I work hard for my money and if I want to spend it on gas then by god I will. I am not denying that hipermiling at it's extremes will improve gas milage, I am just stating that it can be taken too far. I think turning your car off at any point unless you are parking is stupid. As a motorcyclist, I understand the need to get out of the way quickly at times. It is kind of hard to do that with the car off. Automakers aren't shutting the engine off completely, much like the northstar system in cadillacs, only a portion of the cylinders aren't being fed gasoline.

[PaleMelanesian]

Ummm... yes they are turning the engine off. The engine is off - not turning at all. Honda's hybrids do it. Toyota's hybrids do it. Ford's hybrids do it. GM's hybrids do it. As mentioned above, other makers, like your own BMW, are also designing systems to do the same.

UPS has a policy for their drivers to shut down any time they're stopped for deliveries. You can be sure they studied it in detail and found it worthwhile.

[Daox]

Hypermiling in its simplest form can provide substancial gains as shown by the multitude of members here. There is not even a basis to argue that.

You are also wrong about automakers providing technology that shuts engines off completely. If you had done what Metro asked you would know this.

Your ignorance on this subject and the attitude of "I work hard for my money and if I want to spend it on gas then by god I will." is exactly why gas prices are high to begin with. High demand brings about high prices. This not only leads to higher gas prices, but higher prices of everything that is shipped which is pretty much everything you will ever buy. Gasoline and diesel prices effect everything. What happens when high prices start putting truckers out of business? Demand for trucking goes up and prices increase. Its a chain effect and I'm sorry that you are too blind to see it. You and others like you are the main problem.

If you continue to post here with this continued attitude you will simply be banned. Your posts are neither constructive nor helpful to anyone here.

[bennelson]

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

my information comes from an auto mechanic of over 30 years.......... I work hard for my money and if I want to spend it on gas then by god I will.

I think part of the problem is that we do have lots of people thinking "old-school" about these things. In many ways, cars have changed a LOT in the past three decades.

People have many different reasons for wanting to save gas. Even if I were filthy rich, I would still try to save gas. It is a limited resource. In my opinion, the only responsible thing to do is try to be conservative with it, no matter what the current price of gasoline is, or may ability to pay that price.

We are starting to see this change as part of our culture now. In many ways, the general population is starting to look down on fuel-inefficient vehicles, and hybrids and fuel-efficient cars are becoming "cool".

I recently saw a television commercial for Mitsubishi, advertising four cars each with four-cylinder engines. That was the SELLING-POINT was that they were four-cylinder, and it was a pretty slick add.

This bit of the conversation seems to be getting a little off from the topic of just listing hypermiling tips. No need to start a flame war here. Perhaps we should have a "Debates" section?

[dremd]

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

In my opinion, and by no means do I mean any disrespect, I think that almost the entirety of this list is BS. I drive a 1999 BMW 323i, and on the freeway, I get 30mpg, around town, 22-25. If you cannot afford the gas, DON'T BUY A CAR!!!!! The one that erks me the most is "shut off your engine if you are going to be stopped for more than a few seconds." This is an all around bad idea. Here is my reasoning:

Since no one ever seems to reply to these comments; I will.

First off I must admit that I felt the same way as you not all that long ago; and I felt like a lot of these hypermiling tequniques was like drinking the coolaide.

The way I figure it is if you use 30% less fuel then you can spend that $ on something else.

With that being said

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

1) The gas required for a vehicle to idle is almost none at all. You WILL NOT be at a stop light long enough for it to matter. The gas required to start your car with the engine shut off requires much more gas than sitting at idle. Just watch your tachometer next time you start your car, the needle jumps up doesn't it? Just remember simple physics, "...an object in motion tends to stay in motion, an object at rest tends to stay at rest..."

First off engine off uses 0 fuel Starting uses some fuel, but not much more than idiling for the ammount of time that the starter is spinning.

In my Opinion overall break even is 30 seconds, for fuel only it's probably 5 seconds. it requires very little fuel to start a car

And in the personal evidence department it was worth 4 mpg in my supra and is worth 8~10 mpg in my golf.

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

2) By starting your car, you are draining the battery. The engine will have to use more power from the alternator to replace this power, therefore increasing the auxiliary load on your engine, therefore lowering fuel economy.

Believe it or not the electrical requrement isn't all that great. (take a look at the guys whith no alternators, they use their starter quite a bit and don't have a way to recharge without issue.) If your car requires long cranking to start a warm engine then the break even point will be longer (15 seconds?).

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

3) Increased wear and tear on your engine and starter. By shutting your engine off, you are then draining your oil back into the oil pan. Thus relying on the oil left "hanging" on the parts to sufficiently lube all the moving parts on start up. This is why it is said that starting your engine is the harshest thing you can do to your engine. The increase in maintenance cost will offset the savings in fuel cost.

Mine's still working :-)
I have not yet heard of anybody on this forum replacing a starter yet. appears to be a non issue.
I must admit that it is hard to believe.
I have seen someone work it out for 4x increased starter wear and it still worked out cheaper. Does anybody remember this?

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

I apologize for the rant, and I mean no disrespect, but some of these ideas are ludicrous. You should just drive normally, and you will not cause an accident, and you will not beat your engine up.

I'm in no way offended, I don't believe that anyone else is either.
IMHO some of the ideas are EXTREME and are only useful in competition.
IMHO all of them can be used in the correct situation safely now as far as everyday it is unlikely that many use more that a dozen or so.

Edit: Well I see others have replied; but I will let my post stand.

[musicollector]

Well, the government of our province, who has done extensive research on this, has put out a brochure saying that idling more than 20 seconds is a waste of fuel and that there will be no adverse effects on the engine. So, who are less knowledgeable people such as you and me to argue with them?

Nobody is talking about shutting off the engine at traffic lights - that is ludicrous! We are talking of wanton waste of fuel during unnecessary idling.

Don't jump to conclusions that those of us who care about saving gas cannot afford cars. My vehicle is worth over $120,000 - I can buy two BMW's with that. We just happen to care about the environment.

[MazdaMatt]

I care about money. If i could turn small woodland creatures and trees into money, i'd do it. "I work hard for my money" (quote) too, and I would rather spend it on fun stuff than transportation. I drive a race car. It eats a lot of gas. I'd rather not waste gas in my daily driving so those dollars can go directly to my race car gas.

Yes, a number of hte tips are silly and will only be useful to those people who aready achieve insane milage, but the list is DEFINATELY effective and proven by those people who have insane mileage.

BTW, I use about 25-30% less gas now than when I started reading up on this site, AND I learned some valuable aero lessons that I have applied to my race car. Read on and by all means maintain your skeptisism... just don't brush off sound ideas as being extreme and rediculous... try it out a little bit at a time.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by bimmerguy

I don't use any of the hipermiling techniques, I think the idea is rediculous. I work hard for my money and if I want to spend it on gas then by god I will.

Then why would you sign up on a forum that specifically discusses how best to use these techniques?

Not only are you ignorant of some basic facts, you're simply wasting everybody's time.

Buh bye!

[ronarprfct]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

If you're coasting engine off, doing anything other than rolling to a stop will lower your potential fuel economy. Yes, we're talking about tiny differences.

If you're idling and moving at a low speed, then yes, you should just go ahead and park.

The take-home message is: avoid the brake pedal. Parking is one time you may have the option of rolling to a complete stop because there's no set 'stop line' if you have flexibility on which spot you can choose.

My apologies, but it seems to me, if you are parking, coasting with the engine off, that the only way to make use of any momentum is potential parking. Using the brakes in that instance to get into your preferred parking spot(which would have to be one you could roll out of), would be no different from rolling into it(assuming it is the best place to park), as that speed and momentum is going to be lost-with the exception of what is stored as kinetic energy via PP-anyway. Unless it causes you to have to start up the engine again to make course corrections, just taking the first spot, assuming there is no difference in potential kinetic energy stored(higher parking space, greater incline), is no less efficient than orbiting. Correct me if I am wrong, but make sure I am before you correct me .

[Will]

Wow... Looks like I missed "the big show" what a shame.

I like tip #105, also. That means don't listen to to the theme from the show "Airwolf" while making your way through traffic.

Seriously, I have literally increased my MPG in my Metro from 42 when I first got it built to 51-52 now. That is all thanks to this site and the people on it! I would have settled for 41 before seeing this site, and felt good about it.

[azraelswrd]

I'm in the same boat with Will -- stuck at 33 because I didn't know better. Now I'm at 43. I'll take that.

MazdaMatt -- you're going to turn Bambi into fuel?

I'm surprised no one raised the "troll" flag earlier. He comes in blasting hypermiling on a hypermiling forum based on incomplete information and here we are now. I've seen a lot of lists but the one here is better organized than most and nobody ever said to do all of them. (remember the "orbit parking lot to bleed out momentum" tip? )

[MazdaMatt]

Personally, i think the list is totally overblown and should be prefixed with a "First 5 things you should work on, in order" so the newbs aren't overwhelmed and their opinion ruined by a list that has too many "small things". Its the 80/20 rules... 80% of the progress comes from 20% of the effort. Give people a small list that will cover 80% of the benefits and it will seem more legit.

[Daox]

The list does need refinement, and there is functionality built to take advantage of rating the tips as far as novice to advanced skill wise, and effectiveness of the tip. Its just a matter of time before it all gets put together and working.

[Will]

Originally Posted by Daox

and there is functionality built to take advantage of rating the tips as far as novice to advanced skill wise, and effectiveness of the tip.

I love the "novice to advanced" approach!!!!

[Z man]

Most intelligent people should know what rules can apply to them and how safe each thing on the list may be for their vehicle and for themselves.

Obviously turning the engine off has its risks.
I think a lot of this can be offset by the much increased attention paid to driving in general.

[dcb]

Originally Posted by Z man

Obviously turning the engine off has its risks.

I have to laugh everytime someone says a bigger bike is safer. It is the rider far more than anything else that determines safety, weather you are driving a sportbike or a semi.

99.9999% of accidents are of the "failure to reduce speed" variety. How many "hold my beer and watch this" type accidents have you seen, or even participated in You know how it goes, VROOM-SKREE-SPLATTT. Or sometimes it is just VROOM-SPLATTT.

Engine off is NOT statistically on the risk radar.