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Old 10-06-2010, 01:43 PM   #143 (permalink)
3-Wheeler
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Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Southern WI
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AlienMobile - '00 Honda Insight
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jimepting View Post
....It would allow pretty reliable lean burn operation at 60 MPH in most terrain and that in itself would be a huge improvement....
Yes, jimepting, that has been my situation as well. It seems difficult to maintain lean burn at 55 mph, especially while encountering small, low grade hills.

And for that reason, if high MPG's are on order for the day, then the backroads at 45 mph are called for to maintain lean burn.

I'm most interested to see what type of improvement there is at 55 mph.

In the winter time, some of the backroads get real choppy, and I am forced to take a different route to work, which typically means higher speeds. Hopefully the tail extension will make this easier to accomplish.

I will be doing a series of coast downs on the way to work as well. This involves taking a obtuse drive to work, but the road is little traveled, so it is safer for this sort of thing. I can compare similar coast downs from last year with 70% under-body coverage, and see what the difference is, now that the car has 90% under-body coverage and the tail.

Note: that my coast downs also consider outside temperature, which has a large affect on the coast down numbers. I log this info in the coast down spreadsheet.

Jim.

Last edited by 3-Wheeler; 10-06-2010 at 01:49 PM..
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