Help Me with Hypermiling.
 

I have a 2000 accord Automatic, I can't seem to hypermile. Despite my best efforts I only get around the EPA MPG sometimes less :(

My car doesn't seem to enter DFCO. I can be coasting downhill in Drive at around 55/60 mpg, but the engine load and Fuel use (gallons/minute) stay at idle levels

When driving on a flat road P&G doesn't seem to save gas. I'm better off maintaining a choice constant speed. Load will be ~80 and MPG will be slightly above EPA estimates


Tires are all at the sidewall max.

have you read the stickies? pump up the air, use the EOC, turn off the engine while stopped...............

I also have a 2000 Accord (V6) automatic and have great trouble beating EPA. Tires at 44 psi. I can go to DFCO easily when above 2000 rpm. There are other tricks I use to get to DFCO below 2000. Read mpg on Scangage II and it will read 9999 when in DFCO. When the rpm drops to 1200 I lose DFCO, so at 1300 rpm I down shift from D4 to D3 and when I reach 1300 rpm again I drop to 2 and even to 1 and stay in DFCO all the way to the stop sign.

How long are your trips?

Never Engine Off Coast a traditional automatic, only Engine ON Coast.....otherwise you will be replacing the transmission at a quicker interval

Very short...11.7 miles round trip for the standard trip twice a day. First trip is always with a cold engine. Longer when going other places. When I can, I use a golf cart for trips under 6 miles. Can't use the golf cart legally for the 11.7 mile trips because of the speed limit on the required roads.

And, no, I don't use EOC. I leave the engine on when coasting, whether or not I'm in gear.

This is right near the best efficiency point for that engine RPM, so you have little or nothing to gain by P&G.

What is your speed, RPM, and MAP at those conditions?

I hope you can read this as an encouragement, lower your expectations. Don't compare yourself with the elite. Be happy with improving your personal best. You drive an automatic which severely limits the techniques available to you, the biggest is not being able to EOC. I've never been able to see any benefit in the high load P&G that most talk about with my automatic. I do better with DWL and braking as little as possible. I do find a gentle P&G helps a little to keep the engine load low. I think you posted elsewhere your commute is only like 3.5 miles in the city? Is that right? Short trips and cold starts kill mileage. As for DFCO, It's only really helpful when you want to slow down. On the highway, a neutral coast will help you more. I may have already said elsewhere that you may actually be going into DFCO but the torque app may not be reading it properly.

When I bought My Rondo was when I started really getting interested in hypermiling. I got really discouraged seeing all these guys posting crazy high mileage numbers, and like you, I was struggling to meet EPA much less beat it. Then I realized all those guys are driving standards or hybrids. Now that I have a standard trans car, I am confident of what I suspected before. Much of what is posted here that works well with a manual, doesn't work well with an auto. I've tried to hypermile that car for nearly 10 years. My numbers never looked that great on here, but when I compared my mileage to the average Rondo owner, I was getting great mileage. Be patient, experiment, listen to the guys that drive automatics, and don't lose heart. You will improve. You may want to look at some mods as well. Aero mods will help on the highway and mods to help you warm up faster will help minimize the hit on cold starts.

Mixed use, city is usual 7-10 miles rt 5 days a week Highway is about 30 miles a week

Not sure I'll check next time I drive

You're in Texas, short trips aren't a problem. I find I hit EPA around 1-2 miles from a cold start, depending on the car and therefore techniques used. My Prius does all the really short trips (1-3 miles) and still beats the EPA.

I disagree, you still take a hit with cold starts and short trips. Even if you can beat the EPA, you won't beat it by as much as if you had longer trips and a fully warmed up engine.

Currently I only have a Trip average display on my 06 Jazz, but I find that it falls for the first 5 miles, on a highway journey, after a cold start, then starts to climb. Does that pretty much no matter how I drive.

Thanks, for all the advice. Took a weekend trip, and discovered the car will enter DFCO it's just very picky about it. Need to experiment more do see how I can keep the car in that mode.

The torque app crashed on my and I lost average MPG data :( anyone know if there is a way to keep a backup of this info. Torque does have a logging feature but I can't understand it

This, are you trying to get DFCO while coasting or when you already have to stop?

Now you're talking about the difference between a 'reason' and an 'excuse'. Most of what people put down to 'cold start' penalty is more about maneuvering out of your driveway/ parking space/ waiting to turn onto the main road etc. If I reverse out of my drive, it's not unusual to see 100-200l/100km on the SG. That takes a while to average out. If I park in reverse, on a 0*C morning, I can see 5.5 within 1 km in a 2 ton van!

That's also why the Prius does so well on short trips, the EV mode eliminates the "parking maneuver" penalty. 12 miles isn't what I'd call a short trip.

For above freezing, the cold start penalty is fairly small in my experience - even smaller if you have a grill block.

Don't be discouraged. You may want to check a few things first before starting any hypermiling prematurely and being discouraged by not so stellar results. First make sure you're running some low viscosity synthetics which meet the specs for your car. Amsoil's a good starting point. The K24 on the wife's TSX goes great with the low viscosity ATF and 5w30 with frictional modifiers like ws2 and NMF. Make sure the caliper pins are lubricated on your brakes so the brakes aren't dragging. Also make sure the park brake releases completely too. It could be some no so obvious stuff hanging you up...

I was trying to say that DFCO is most beneficial when you are intending to slow down to stop or holding your speed going downhill.
The Torque app comment was regarding my experience. I've used the free version of the Torque app with my Rondo and it doesn't show DFCO where the Scangauge was previously showing it. might just be because it's the free version though.

I totally agree that there are techniques and mods you can use to minimize the hit, I do it all the time. 99% of my trips are shorter that than to the poster you referenced. You can control how you drive but you can't always control where you have to drive or how many stop signs or traffic density. That all has an effect. You can time lights but you have to stop at stop signs. He doesn't have a Hybrid either which isn't a fair comparison IMO.
Also, his trip is 5.85 miles I think. He said 11.7 round trip. I agree that warm weather reduces the penalty but there is still a penalty. My mileage has been much better since the weather warmed up.
All that and I've still missed re-explaining my point. What I was getting at, and I still believe to be true, is that if all other conditions are equal, a car will burn more fuel from a cold start than from a hot start. That's all. Try that 1 km drive in your van you were describing, after it's had a long run on the highway and tell me if it's not any better.

In regards to warm up. I watch the oil temp and coolant temp on torque. Anything less than 10 miles is a short trip in my opinion. My car seems to take an eternity to warm up though. Even 55-60° outside and it take near 10 miles for oil to be completely warmed up and coolant around 7 miles. From 180° oil to 220° seems to be a large jump in economy. Just what I have seen. If my car started at full operating temp I could push 60 mpg everyday. Not to mention factoring in cold tires as well. If trips are that short you can bump up a few more psi to compensate for them never truly reaching temps themselves. I typically see 3-4 psi raise on tpms sensors on my 13 mile commute to work. Last 4-5 miles is where the warm up time is where the good Fe numbers show up.

I only have an Trip Average mpg display on my Jazz, but I know that from a cold start, and mainly highway driving, it drops for the first 7 miles before recovering. In the winter, I leave the temp control in the car set to Blue until the low temp indicator light goes out. Only then do I ask for cabin heat.

Prius owners regularly complain about how bad they are on a cold start. In our Texas like climate, I've found the exact opposite :)

Economy will always be better with a fully warmed up car, but keep in mind that a 'cold' start might mean 40*C in some parts of the world. My economy is best in winter- although I actually find it very hard to tease any seasonal variability out of my graphs - and we do have the odd 0*C morning.