Allo
 

Just saying hi

I'm in the market for a new commuter vehicle and also need a truck. I was googleing around for light trucks with high MPG and came across an article about Phil Knox's pickup. I searched around for other of Phil Knox's projects and came across this wonderful forum :D

I was already leaning toward a Toyota T100, but the MPG that Phil got out of his truck sealed the deal.

I drive a 94 Taurus right now and I'm able to eek out about 25mpg at the moment. I commute about 60 miles round trip, almost entirely freeway driving.

Lots of great ideas here. Looking forward to reading as much as I can and contributing where possible :)

Welcome to the forum from a fellow Californian! Looking forward to see what you get and what you do to it! The first thing I would do, even before you get a new vehicle, is get a Scangauge 2 or Ultragauge. If your new truck is pre-1996 (pre-OBDII), you can build an MPGuino for the same use (lots of threads here about that!). It will help you learn what driving style is best for you and your vehicle, especially most efficient speed.
Here is the ultragauge website: UltraGauge Automotive Information Center and OBDII Scan Tool
And this is for the scangauge, however, you can get it here at EM for a discount:ScanGauge - Trip Computer + Digitial Gauges + ScanTools
Keep us posted!

Jeff88: Those are pretty neat! I was looking at those while browsing around on the site. I'm familiar with scraping data off sensors and the ECU for calculation of various data points so i'll probably home brew it. The truck will likely be pre-OBDII. I would like to build a heads up display with a pico projector mounted under the dash, at the same time pump that information to a bluetooth module so the logging goes straight to my phone. That way i can analyze the data or script it out to see how certain mods take effect.

I'm pretty excited to get things started :)

Unless many folks here, I wouldn't try to discourage you from getting a pre-'95 truck, since it would give you more freedom to mod its drivetrain, eventually including a Diesel swap as an option :D