[Big Dave]

Richard:

I'm game. Sorry I didn't get signed on earlier, but I was not on the site for a few days.

I can bring to the game some experience in getting good MPG out of a full sized pickup while driving the limit.

On the subject of drafting I have little additional to offer beyond this:
1) The manufacturers are working on radar/data communications/ and control to allow really close draft by tractor-trailers. this would make the rigs into virtual trains. Only the front guy is truly driving. Everybody else sequentially snugs up and locks in and lets the other guy drive the "train." The electronics handle the rest.
2) Drafting may really only be for the big rigs. Because a lot of truckers don't sound like college professors, the rubes think they are dummies. Fact of the matter is that truckers are highly skilled drivers and eminently capable of sorting themselves into an optimized train with just a few CB exchanges. But average four-wheeler and pick drivers are not that disciplined.


As for your "12 mpg car" that is very common in the pickup community. Most pickups are (IMO) wildly overgeared. 3.73s seem to be the default ratio and 4.11s and 4.56s are far more common than the "economy" 3.55s now offered. I believe I have found nearly the optimum for my truck with 3.08 gears and a double overdrive. The thing has gotten touchy about how I drive it. That tells me I have run out all the (fuel-wasting) reserve power and now have my engine output closely aligned with road load.

As for driving, I am not like the occasional pickup "MPG" guy you hear posturing on the Web who claims some outlandish MPG. then he tells you the secret: He drives real slow. This (IMO) is disingenuous. You drive somewhere because walking is too slow. If you are willing to waste your time, the optimum MPG vehicle is a motorized street luge running at 2 MPH. I do assume that a person's time is worth something. Brakes? I got 190,000 miles out of a set of OEM brakes. I must not use them too much. some people call me Sir Coastalot. I am far from being Wayne Gerdes, but I can time lights well and guage a good coast when i see the opportunity.

If all goes well I'll go out to the scorching plains of Texas and see the guru of pickup aerodynamics and we can mutually contemplate economical pickup trucks.

But I'm in on your project.