[Clev]

I borrowed my wife's car ('04 Saturn Ion, 5 speed, wide performance tires) to visit my folks for a few days. My drive was from Southern California (San Bernardino mountains) to Stockton (Central Valley), about 413 miles each way.

On the trip up, I tried a limited pulse and glide, from 60 mph to 75 mph, with the engine in neutral (can't install a "kill" button in the wife's car, and didn't want to wear out the ignition switch.) I did turn the key off during the downhill glide down the Grapevine. There was moderately heavy traffic, so I couldn't do a lot of P&G (my policy is that if I hinder other cars, I'm just wasting their gas, and what's the point then?) I also did a P&G on the air conditioner, turning it on medium-high until I was uncomfortably cold, and them switching it off and recirculating until it was uncomfortably warm. (In 85+ degree weather, I could generally leave it off 6-8 minutes for every 2 minutes on.) Average speed when not in P&G was 68-72 mph, and 10 miles were on a rough country road. Overall average, 35.05 mpg, which is 4 mpg higher than I ever got in normal (62 mph) driving!

The return trip was Wednesday evening. The traffic was much lighter, so I could P&G quite a bit more, again, either 60-75 or 60-80 depending on how big a gap in traffic I could work with. The cooler temperature meant longer P&G cycles on the A/C, and after a couple of hours, I could turn it off entirely and just run the fan. This time, the trip included the reverse run over the Grapevine (over 15 miles of gliding with the key off!), three stops, and my normal run up and down the hill at home (4,675 feet.) When I filled up this morning, I got 39.09 mpg! This is on a car freeway rated at 32 mpg. Total savings: about $17 vs. my normal 31 mpg in this car.

I can't wait until I get the clutch leak fixed on the Honda--a kill switch will be the first mod!