new here 1998 olds 88
 

Not the most efficient car, however my new job has had me wanting to improve mileage, I'm driving roughly 150 miles a day. About 10 miles of 2 lane highway and the rest interstate. The first thing I did was try to buy a chevy sprint, but I got so excited looking at it and talking to the guy about it he kept the damn thing, my dad used to have one so I'm attached to the idea of owning one. But anyway my 3.8 v6 oldsmobile is bone stock so far, however after blowing a rear tire and switching to some riviera 16 inch wheels with smaller openings in the wheel and bigger tires just on the rear - stuff I had laying around, I noticed a gain In mileage. Which got my gears turning. I have had 2 consecutive tanks of 28 mpg and 28.2 mpg so a small goal so far is to hit 30 mpg, eventually 33 or 34 to beat my buddy's civic that gets 33 lol. I got the car cheap so its already paid itself off 100 fold. I'm very open to cosmeticley changing the car for improved mileage, lowering and air damn. Anyway just a bit about me. I think I'll blend in very well, I get alot of people shaking there head at my crazy ideas and theorys, sorry if I'm slow I'm a high hp diesel guy this gasser stuff is foreign to me lol. Thanks and I look forward to terrorizing my oldsmobile.

One thing I've noticed about those H-bodies is that they are cartoonishly good cruisers. You wouldn't expect it but if you're on a long trip, they are extremely thrifty for their size, and decently thrifty compared to the midsize segment.

I think with some subtle aero and a little habit modificationyou have a really good shot at spanking your buddy's Civic.

I think the style lends itself to some rear wheel skirts, and of course your suggesed air dam will probably yield huge dividends. In fact the air dam is probably going to be the biggest bang for your buck.

Check to ensure that your torque converter lockup is working properly. No point spinning the engine any faster than absolutely necessary.

Air damn was gonna be the first, grill is almost shut as it is stock, wiper resess under the cowl, my antenna doesn't go down anymore, gutted cat good or bad? How do I check lockup?

If the car has a tachometer lockup will be easy to see (you will notice the RPMs drop a few hundred at cruise). Otherwise you will have to tell by ear when the converter is locked.

I have had a few of the Buick 3.8L engines, both older ones and the style you have (Series 2) and I think they probably have the best economy to displacement ratio of any gasoline engine. As you have already seen you can easily do 30mpg without any modifications or hypermiling techniques.

Just a heads up: take a look at the intake manifold gasket. It's fairly thick and you will be able to see it between the manifold and the head. If it looks plastic pull it out and put the updated metal version in. It is a well known issue with that motor. Also it's worth doing the valve cover gaskets if they haven't been done recently. When they leak they dump oil onto the exhaust and the resulting fires caused GM to do a big recall back in the early 2000's.

It does have a tach, I'll look on the way home to see of it locks, I think it does I always thought it was hitting overdrive but it's probably the converter locking. It has stock sized tires on the front, I'll check the gasket to, I've heard about that problem before. Any thoughts on gutting the cat? I have a gutted one identical to mine so I can swap back of I have to, didn't know if it would rob torque or not. It runs about 2000 rpms at 70, I'll try 65 and keep the r's around 1800 and see what happends

Hold the throttle steady at speed and touch the brake pedal it should unlock the TQ and see the tach jump then relock after you release the pedal.

Stays locked like a champ, car has alot of torque at 2k so very easy to maintain speed with a locked converter. Today I was trying to roll through stops and shutting the car down, gonna read up on the hypermileing a bit more. Text a guy about a swift and there's a chevy metro close to me cheap, but I wanna see what an air damn on the olds will do, any thoughts or threads on running slightly taller tire on the rear than the front? My thinking is it reduces drag but I'm a newb so I don't know.

As much as you drive, get a Metro or Swift ASAP. It will pay off fast. You're spending about $240/mo on gas

Yeah I pay alot in gas, plus between me and the wife we pay about 400 dollars a month. But my brother rides with me so we split gas, so no extra stops. He lives with me, works with me, and we go to the same gym! so if I hypermile a metro and am splitting gas I'll have to find a place to keep on my extra money.

Here's another idea for you: lease a Prius or something and use the gas savings to pay the lease. Then you won't have to worry about reliability

Edit: leasing won't work cause u drive too many miles. You need to find a fuel-efficient car with a monthly payment of like $150 or less. Maybe used

Now there's an idea. I just need a car that will haul 425 pounds of dude, I'm 230 Bubby is 195 and our gym stuff at highway speed lol

You might see if you can find a cheap corvette.
They are very aerodynamic and can hold plenty of 'dude'.
Might even do a motor swap on it, find one with a bad v8,
and swap in maybe a 4-cyl. :)

Like here is a 94 vette for $3,000 needs engine work..
http://stlouis.craigslist.org/cto/5130138607.html

What year?

The 84 to 94 "C4" are easy to find, older ones are 'classics'.
An 84 is ideal because the 'crossfire' motor was an orphan.
If an 87+, they have aluminum cylinder heads, and you can probably sell the motor for a good price and get a lot of the money back, even if not running.

Might be something worth looking into if the seats out of one didn't cost more than a metro. Lol

That would be a weird but fun project and I think further discussion of it should go into a different thread.

Points to consider: good luck finding a four-cylinder motor already adapted to longitudinal installation. Your choices begin and end with compact truck motors. Hmm, an LK5...

Knowing what I know about it, it makes me think about bolting an AMC 150 into a C4, with an appropriate bellhousing to make the jump. I think it could be done.

Trunk space stinks.

You can find comparable aero with more seats in something a lot more practical. Corvettes cede aero drag reduction to aero advantages, reduced lift or increased downforce.

+1 on switching to something more economical, but making improvements on the cheap to the ride you have is money in the bank, regardless of what you do later. You're already looking at paying certain costs per mile (and big points to you for carpooling), reducing that with your existing car is a huge initial savings. The payback interval on a lawn edging airdam is a couple of tanks, but the payback on a whole different car might be a couple of years.

Just ordered 17 buck worth of 6 inch lawn edging, 20 foot roll look a looks like i get it tuesday. That's perfect that way I can finish up this current hipermiling tank and see what it gets and then on the next tank see if it helps. Maybe run some down the side of the car to? See how it works out i guess

Would it help to jack up my rear shocks to get the front of the car lower? I don't want the car to be raked to bad I don't know if it will cause more drag.

Don't rake it at all. If you're going to do anything to the suspension then lower the entire car, front and rear. Don't go crazy with it but it does have a positive effect.

Plus raising the rear on a front drive car just makes you look like an idiot to the car guys. If you're like most guys willing to make ecomods to your car you're not too concerned with what other people think, but there it is.

Look at what some of the other guys here have done with lawn edging. It's crazy, and some of it looks really quite good - like store bought air dams. Keep in mind that you'll need to add some kind of bracing to keep it from folding back at speed, but not too rigid so it can give if it collides with something and absorb the shock.