Uphill/Downhill P-and-G

[serialk11r]

Pulse uphill, coast downhill. Your speed will be more consistent for the same average speed, so you have less total energy lost to drag. It's also good because people get annoyed at pulse and gliding, and if you can maintain speed then less people are pissed off at you.

[brucey]

When we're saying pulse uphill, we're really meaning maintain speed uphill using the engine, and not to actually accelerate, right? I cant imagine fighting gravity and accelerating is going to work in our favor.

[bestclimb]

Hills are energy storage. I try to store energy as efficiently as I can. That means highest gear the car can hold an acceptable speed in at an RPM that makes enough power to get it done without going into open loop.

I try to recoup that energy as efficiently as I can which means if the grade allows I do it which mean without running the engine in an inefficient way ( high vac low load) or any form of braking.

End result is that I pulse up and glide down. If the grade is so shallow that I lose a significant amount of speed I will pulse down with short pulses and long glides. If it is so steep that I begin to get up to an unsafe speed I will preemptively engine brake (DFCO) and brake.

[serialk11r]

Originally Posted by brucey

When we're saying pulse uphill, we're really meaning maintain speed uphill using the engine, and not to actually accelerate, right? I cant imagine fighting gravity and accelerating is going to work in our favor.

Well, in normal pulse and glide you're going to have speed variations and acceleration, so I sometimes pulse uphill if I know the downhill isn't steep enough for me to stay above my target lower range speed. I have a crappy 5 speed manual so I have crappy cruising rpms and therefore plenty of reserve power to do this.