FE aside, how far do you drive?
 

Miles or KMs per week, month, year... ?

I know the point of the great FE quest is to save fuel, but in some ways it`s a bummer to drive so little since I don`t get much chance to experiment or see results. Even at my mediocre mileage (a bit over 30 MPG), I`m at a quarter tank in my truck and haven`t filled up since Jan 10th. Yes it`s good that I haven`t been burning much gasoline, but honestly, the "game" aspect of improving my economy is getting a bit boring. My scooter is doing "better" because the tiny littletank at least lets me see how I`m doing every 150 miles or so (and those miles are going by quicker than my truck`s miles). Does anybody else here wish for more driving in order to get more "play" (filling more tanks)?

My daily transportation is mostly by bicycle. I pedal to work every day (any weather) and do midweek catch-up or restock shopping by bicycle. Once a week (sometimes two weeks) I do more of a stock-up shopping trip, usually in my pickup, but lately it`s been on the scooter as long as the roads are dry. Appointments "in town" have usually been by bicycle provided I have plenty of time on whatever day, by truck otherwise, now mostly covered with the scooter.

I didn`t track miles or MPH until last Oct, but going by when I changed my oil, it looks like I put about 6,000 miles on my pickup last year. In December, I bought a large motorscooter. The jury is still out on how that will affect the miles I put on the truck and on how many miles the scooter will see, but offhand it looks like the truck will be down to about 2500 miles per year and the scooter will probably get around 5000-6000 this year, most likely less after (if) the novelty wears off.

EDIT: I don`t want to give the wrong impression- those are my solo miles. Whenever my wife and I go anywhere together, it`s in her car, which does see a lot of miles. We do have to track miles in her car (for tax purposes), but I have no way to determine how many of the 7200 "personal" miles it saw last year were with me driving or as a passenger.

About 300 miles per week.

I don't know how many miles I drive, but the last time I got gas was a couple of months ago.

I've not kept track for awhile but will start the next time I get gas.

50-60 miles per week but about 10k-15,000 miles a year, a lot of road trips.
it always seems the less you drive the less you should have to care about efficiency, if you only drive 10 miles a week 35mpg is going to look the same as 20mpg because of how little it affects you

Nothing wrong with that - using a method of transportation adapted to the purpose is good.



I've done 29.362 km in the past year - 18250 miles.
I hardly ever use the car on short hops in-town.
If that happens, it's usually in combination with a longer trip or my regular commute.


Next week the city council will cut traffic through the city, which means I'll need to drive all the way around it, and will instantly add 10 km - 10% , some 6 miles - to my daily commute. So much for driving less :rolleyes:

In addition, traffic jams are expected just to get out of town ; and it means getting out on a big road (PSL 56 mph) with a still-cold engine.
I'm likely going to feel it in the MPG and total fuel used. :mad:

Saying that it doesn't matter as much what kind of mileage you get if you only drive a little is not really true, it's almost the same mind set that says that a hybrid SUV is good because it gets better mileage then a regular SUV even tho it's never used as a utility vehicle.
I drive about 9,000 miles a year, filling up about once a month, I try to get the best mileage I can even tho I drive less then some other people.

I drive about 120 miles a week, give or take.

Just got a new job and I'm happy to say I now drive 3770/yr or 73/week there and back yearly vs 11k/yr at my old job. I should only need to fill up about 8 times a year, and I'm very happy about that.

I drive my Yaris 22,000km/year and another 8,000km/yr on my variouse motorcycles...for a total of 30,000km/year. If my average speed is 60km/hr then I spend 500hrs/year driving and if I average 50km/hr then I spend 600hrs /year driving! My commute to work is an 84km round trip, which consumes 70 minutes of the day.

138 miles/day. Yes. DAY. 5 days/week.

Consuming and emitting less, as well as spending less are all nice, but honestly I`m trying for better F.E. more for fun than enything else. Kind of like racing, I guess, but with a lower budget and not so much adrenaline:D. I find the whole thing fascinating all the way from simple tricks like putting an automatic transmision in N at stop lights up to the far out aero mods that some members manage. But I almost feel like I`m missing out on half my "turns" by not driving more (yes, that sounds really stupid). Does anybody else ever harbor desires to drive more and fill up more often?

Wow, I never ran those numbers before. There`s definitely something to be said for speed.

Over the summer, I was at about 2000 miles a week. (Job)

Now I'm about 200 miles a week, probably less than that unless I need to leave town.

"Does anybody else ever harbor desires to drive more and fill up more often?"

NO! :(

I drive 110 miles to work per day. I fill up twice a week. No, I don't want to do it any more.

But I agree with the "game" mentality. It helps me keep my sanity for 2 hours every day.

What is the difference in f/e from being stopped in drive vs neutral?

I see this as being the 3rd stage of a three step process for me, related not only to driving but also my life. I have mostly driven way too fast through my life, ironically to be safer and get away from bad drivers, but probably mostly because I didn't want to waste time sitting in a car. I tried to focus on keeping the speed down, which helped.

This changed a few years ago, precipitated by a typical 35 mile drive to the next town where I passed 103 cars and only 3 cars passed me, while I felt that I was driving conservatively. This got me to thinking that, well, maybe I was still driving too fast, and it could be this wasn't as safe as I'd thought.

It seemed to me that the less cars that I passed and passed me, the safer I'd be, so on the way back I tried to stay in the space way between cars, and neither passing nor driving so slow that cars would pass me. Amazingly, I managed to drive 10 miles in the zone of having no car beside me!!! And I kept count, so if I passed a car, I'd let another go by me, so the balance came out evenly. Since then I have always been aware of being in this zone or space while I'm driving, though there are still times that I get impatient and whip around someone or a group of cars, then get back in the zone. This has definitely helped me to relax while driving and to not get so impatient - because even if everyone stops, I'm still right there in that zone between cars.

I see the focus on f/e hypermiling as the 3rd stage for me, where I am always conscious of the f/e and therefore always driving as conservatively as possible with the fuel (and my life). I have done this in the past at times, doing the pulse and glide or EOC on long hills or when almost out of gas, and invariably have always turned my car off at stops, having worn out a few ignition switches through the years. I used to have to drive for every little thing that I'd do, and now drive as little as possible, though I'm interested in getting a better f/e equipped car for taking out of town trips, or if I decide at some point to take a trip 'round the country.

...an engine idling against the torque converter is under load which increases its fuel consumption.

...slipping the automatic transmission into neutral at a stop is one of the "new tricks" Detroit has discovered and is implementing in new cars...GM does this in the 6T40 6A tranny in the Cruze.

When not travelling for work I do about 100-150 miles per week, 80% of which are urban / suburban but not places buses go. I get 4-5 weeks out of a tank which is taking me about 600-650 miles at the moment.

I used to have a job which involved travel and I miss it sometimes. Until I remember the days of getting up before 5 and not getting home again until after 8 with 5-600 miles and a full days work in between.

bdesj -

57142 miles in 3 years (from 2008 to 2010)
~19047 miles per year
~366 miles per week
~52 miles per day

Don't be unhappy if you can't play "the game" because you're healthier for it. "The game" is a way of dealiing with an otherwise bad situation.

CarloSW2

110 miles per day. Last year 26926 miles.

When talking of wanting to drive more to get sharp on the techniques that make you more efficient, I can agree that it would. But, good instrumentation will help be the little 'reminder' that you sometimes need to remember you are trying to be more efficient.

I am constantly refusing to go somewhere even if I need to until another trip is needed to combine with it so I won't waste fuel on single short trips.

250 miles a week commuting, and anything from 50-200 miles on top running about.

I reckon it averages out at 350/week, so 18200 miles a year- excluding any continental driving holidays

After I started trying for better FE, but before I got my UltraGauge, I slipped into N at stoplights. After I got the UG, it showed me that the difference between idling against the TC vs idling in N was about .1 gph. So for $0.30 per hour of idling, I choose to leave it in gear.

Idling against the TC does take more fuel, but not as much as I expected. An offsetting factor is that the idle speed goes down when in gear (on my car).

Oh, and about 225 miles/week for the commute.

~250 miles per week... I definitely enjoy the 'game' and would probably lose interest if I didn't have to drive as much. As it is, at ~800 miles per tank with the Jetta, I only get to see results once a month.

Since my commute route is back roads at a leisurely pace, I find the time I'm driving to be my favorite part of the day.

I did about 20,000 miles in the 12 months ending August, 2010, but it'll probably be more like 8,000 for the 12 months after 8/2010.

I definitely miss it. I enjoy driving, the "operating the machine" part of it, the scenery, and the chance to be out in the middle of nowhere by myself once in a while with a good excuse. (Driving around/across Montana, mostly.)

I went back to school and didn't buy a parking permit, as a way to make myself ride the bus. I got one fairly expensive parking ticket (Don't park in Faculty Reserved, is all I can tell you about that), but still nowhere near the cost of a permit, let alone a permit plus gas.

Best part of riding the bus is watching out the window as those poor suckers brush and scrape snow and frost.

So I'd say I miss driving, but I don't miss commuting.

...before I retired: ~250 miles per week, minimum, getting 40-42 mpg!

...after I retired: ~50 miles per week, maximum, getting 30-32 mpg!

132 or 141 miles per day, depending on which office I'm working at, or roughly 36,000 miles a year.

Needless to say, I'm done with it. I'm in the process of hunting for a job AND a home that are within bicycling distance of each other at the most. I've been doing a similarly bad commute since I was 19, and life is too short to sit in a car for 1,000 hours a year.

I drive about 3,800 miles a year.

Typically between 7000 to 8000 miles a year. Down from 18,000 to 21,000 miles a year in the late 1990's. I still live in the same place. I just made some lifestyle changes and made it a goal to reduce my total gasoline consumption.

I've also upped my FE from about 23 mpg in the late 1990's to about 29 mpg now. My FE now would be better if I kept the same mix of driving that I did back in the 1990's. But I do less long trips now and most of my driving is now local. A greater percentage of my driving now is also hauling loads (mulch, building materials, musical instrument gear, etc.) and less commuting. So my overall gas use per year has dropped by over 70 % in the past 10 years.

To me the "game" has two goals, reduce the miles driven and increase mpg so I've gone from 400 miles per week getting 42mpg to about 50 miles per week getting 50 mpg by changing jobs so I was only a few miles away from work then I moved so I was the same distance from work but instead of being 2-3 miles from the places I go most often outside of work I was 2-8 blocks from the people and places that I go when I'm not at work.
I don't miss filling up to find out what my mileage is, if it takes me two months to use up a tank of gas then I'm excited because I used less gasoline over all so anything that I can do to stretch that out is good in my eyes.
At the same time, if I drive my electric car less I see that as a good thing, I want to find fewer reasons to drive, not more.

Average commute round trip-roughly 105 miles per day...add in the occasional weekend errand and you get an average of about 535 miles per week. I'm rural, and the only jobs(not well-paying ones either!) that I can find are in the State Capital-even in a '93 Festiva, I need all the FE I can(cheaply) get.. :(

I think more fuel evaporates out of my stuff than gets burned. :rolleyes:

My driving will be reduced significantly once I finish school this coming May. I will try to remain as efficient though.