[elhigh]

Any draft is a draft, whether you're behind a tractor-trailer or a Honda Fit, although perhaps tailgating Basjoos' Aerocivic would be a capital waste of effort.

A close-coupled tailgater is doing the lead vehicle a small favor by acting as the lead's new tail. Following closely, the tail vehicle gets less nose drag because that's the lead's problem, and the lead gets less tail drag because that's the tail's problem. Be that as it may, when another vehicle gets too close, I back off the throttle until they get fed up and pass. I don't want anyone closer than fifty feet or so, and that's my absolute minimum.

I don't like cuddling up too close behind a rig not because of the potential risk of flying delaminations but because I can't see anything else. Part of being an alert defensive driver is knowing what's going on ahead of me. I don't want to rely on the juggernaut's inertia to act as my buffer zone, that means that in the event of an emergency, I might wind up driving over somebody's mangled body. The truck will probably be what kills them, but still - I weave to avoid flat squirrels, I sure as heck don't want to hit a person, mangled or otherwise.

So dropping back a second or so behind a regular car gives me some palpable results and still allows me a long view down the road. Now, if only I could find a fellow hypermiler that's doing the same pokey 55mph that I'm doing. Seems to me that everyone out there is in one heckuva hurry and that 55mph speed limit is a lower limit, not an upper limit.