Echo driver - Fuel Economy, Hypermiling, EcoModding News and Forum

taketwoaspirin · 06-09-2008, 10:20 PM

Hi there,

I've been a modestly careful driver for a while, but $3.50/gallon spurred me into learning how to drive better; $4/gallon has me thinking about (cheap) modifications to my car. I've read the 100 hypermiler tips and so far, changing my driving habits has gotten me from 40-41mpg up to 46; I'm hoping for 50 soon!

I do have a question on etiquette: my car is a 2000 Toyota Echo, which came from the factory with a 37mpg combined EPA estimate; the current EPA rating for the same car is 32mpg. Which one do I use for putting my car in the EM "garage"? That makes a huge difference as to my percentage over EPA....

elhigh · 06-09-2008, 10:27 PM

I went to the Mileage.gov website and used the EPA's revised numbers. It feels like cheating, a little...but not enough for me to go back and change it.

Even with the old, optimistic numbers, I used that as a bottom-end point for comparison. I've never done as poorly as that; since really concentrating on it, I've left the estimates, even the blue-sky ones, far, far behind.

Welcome to it bro.

SVOboy · 06-09-2008, 10:29 PM

Eh, we use the new stuff. If that's what the EPA wants to use, that's what we'll use too.

Welcome to ecomodder! Great car!

echomodder · 06-09-2008, 10:34 PM

I use the new numbers. I also have an echo

Great little cars

Although you have a standard which is much easer to hypermile in. I think you'll be getting 50mpg soon. How much hiway driving do you do? Also do you have a scangage? That will help.

taketwoaspirin · 06-09-2008, 10:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by echomodder

I use the new numbers. I also have an echo

Great little cars

Although you have a standard which is much easer to hypermile in. I think you'll be getting 50mpg soon. How much hiway driving do you do? Also do you have a scangage? That will help.

Right now, I do very little highway driving; I changed my commute to a slower but shorter route as part of my fuel-saving initiative. I figured by taking a few minutes longer but cutting a mile or two off the trip, I'd save some gas, and was pleasantly surprised to pick up a few mpgs that way.

And yes, I do have a scanguage. Awesome little things; it helps to make up for the fact that the Echo has basically no useful gauges.

digitaldissent · 06-10-2008, 01:10 AM

yay I love the Echo!! we used to have one and it got great mileage.

Welcome friend

matthewc · 06-12-2009, 02:28 AM

Hi taketwoaspirin,

I just joined and was looking for the other echo drivers and found your post. I have the same year and 4dr manual as you.

So, I'm curious if you've made any new breakthroughs since your last fuel log last year. So far pulse & glide and ICE-on coasting, and keeping at 55 MPH have been my biggest ally. I also bumped my tire pressure up to 40psi.

What have you found most useful?

-Matthew

cfg83 · 06-12-2009, 04:18 AM

taketwoaspirin -

Welcome to EM! Seems like a lot of Echos around here lately, and that's a good thing. One reason we use the new EPA is that it makes it easier to do a "relative" comparison to new car models. It also makes your fuel-sig look more impressive, but that's not our fault, it's the EPA's,

.

CarloSW2

taketwoaspirin · 06-12-2009, 11:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matthewc

Hi taketwoaspirin,

I just joined and was looking for the other echo drivers and found your post. I have the same year and 4dr manual as you.

So, I'm curious if you've made any new breakthroughs since your last fuel log last year. So far pulse & glide and ICE-on coasting, and keeping at 55 MPH have been my biggest ally. I also bumped my tire pressure up to 40psi.

What have you found most useful?

-Matthew

Mostly, the things you've done

The biggest thing was the ScanGauge, so that I *know* what is happening; for example, seeing that first gear is only good for 5mpg, tops, is powerful motivation to get into 5th gear ASAP and leave it there.

My Echo is, unfortunately, technically totaled right now, as I've found rust underneath the plastic lower-body cladding, and the body shop guy told me that it would cost more than the car is worth to repair that. Between that and a change in my driving patterns (detailed below), I'm not really trying to improve my fuel economy any more. Instead, I'm trying to increase the number of days I can keep the car before having to replace it.

I'm also getting nowhere near 50mpg any more, thanks to a number of factors. I had loaned my car to a family member for a couple of months and I'm only this week finishing my first full tank since getting it back, so I'll be updating my fuel log again shortly. If I hadn't loaned it, I would have had a couple of tanks at around 32-35mpg. The current tank is about 38.

I've noticed a couple of things that really hurt my current mileage, but there isn't all that much I can do about them. One is that hills are really bad, particularly steep hills on high-speed roads with a stop sign at the bottom (so there's not much opportunity to recover the lost energy). Another one is short trips; related to that one is cold weather. While winter is the worst, even days like today, when it's cool & damp, are enough to notice, especially when combined with a short trip. Idling at traffic lights where the traffic volume is high enough that it takes three or four light cycles to get through a light is another bad one, particularly when it's cold out or the trip is short enough that the engine hasn't warmed up yet, so shutting it off at the light probably isn't a good idea.

I'm now struggling to get in the high 30's; same car, same techniques, just a different commute is all :-) My company moved so that my commute is now just 3 miles, but those 3 miles involve an interstate, several hundred feet of elevation change, and a quarter-mile of road with sufficient traffic congestion to make me temporarily forget that I'm not in Manhattan.

On the plus side, even though the MPG's have dropped, I still only have to put gas in the car once every couple of months, since I use about a gallon a week.

matthewc · 06-12-2009, 11:40 AM

taketwoaspirin,

Sorry to hear about your echo's ails. Makes me want to ask my mechanic to do an inspection for rust next time I take it in.

Sounds like you got some pretty MPG unfriendly road conditions. Still your gallon a week more than makes up for it. It's similar to the benefits of reducing & reusing over recycling.

I started working from home this past year which has helped my distance a lot but I could still reduce the number of trips I make into town. I've also started doing a better job of planning my trips to accomplish more errands on a single trip.

It would be an invaluable feature for the ecomodder garage to also include GPM(Gallons per month) and GPY(ear) statistics to give props to people like you. They already give props for Bicycle to Auto miles ratio which I applaud. And this may be even more important than the MPG focus. hmmm...

Good luck with keeping your echo alive and hopefully a formidable replacement comes affordably your way soon.

-Matthew