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How should I get into hypermiling?
Howdy!
I'm a mechanical engineering student from Portland, Oregon, and I'm looking at getting into hypermiling a bit more. I mostly just played around with my Justy on dirt roads (37mpg on the highway, 22mpg one time when I kept it in first gear and 4WD for hours on end, but usually about 30mpg), dailying the family Civic and getting about 35mpg in that.
I've been living without any sort of car for the last few months, and after getting 52mpg in a rental Fit in my first serious attempt at hypermiling, I've decided I want to give it a try full-time.
The Justy has a nasty habit of breaking hard-to-find or expensive parts whenever I take it anywhere, so I'm looking at getting either an Insight (if I can find one for under $2000 or so) or just some random $500 car I don't feel bad about basjoosing. Right now, I'm leaning toward using the cheap car as a testbed to see if I can max it out, then buying an Insight and cutting only sparingly into my beautiful aluminum car.
Does anyone have recommendations as to a platform for a cheap car? I'm thinking of just getting a sedan so I can make a good road trip car, but I'm also tempted to get a ZX2 and shoot for top speed or something like that.
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