This is my '08 Toyota 4Runner, a 4,800 pound SUV with 4.7L V8 and all-the-time 4 wheel drive (meaning you can't put it in 2wd mode). With that information you can probably assume that it get's pretty poor fuel economy - and you'd be correct. I average around 14mpg 50/50 highway/city. Yeah that is remarkably bad. But what really shocked me was that the highway milage isn't much better than city. About 15mpg in winter and 16mpg in summer (75mpg). Very bad!
In a few weeks I'm going to drive from my home in Eastern Kansas to Portland Oregon and back, so over 4,000 miles. So I decided to do some ecomodding to the aero dynamics to see if I could improve it's highway performance.
First thing I did was delete the mud flaps, running boards, and roof rack cross bars.
For the rear mud flaps, I cut off the plastic that was extending past the body with a box cutter. I unscrewed and removed the ones in the front, then I attached them to the rear wheel openings, now they're tire spats!
Then it was time to delete the "spoiler," if you can even call it that. It's only function is to direct air onto the back window to keep it clean. Seems to me that it's a big aero drag.
It was just two bolts, some clips, and one wiring connector. I covered the holes with some gaffing tape. Gaffing tape is like duck tape that is really easy to remove and doesn't leave a residue, so like a heavy duty masking tape. It sticks really weld, holds up strong, but doesn't make a mess.
I'll have to figure out a way to get back a third brake light, for safety reasons.
Back to the front end of the vehicle, I did a partial grill block with some more gaffing tap.
I don't know if the grill block is supposed to help with aero or only help with getting the engine warmer faster, but it helps and it was easy.
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