good gas milage when fast???

I always look forward to your posts. I think you missed your calling. Should have been a writer or a comic. Good old Canadian humor and sarcasm. We do seem to be gifted with sarcasm as Canadians.

 

I agree. Red Green proves this.

 

I'm confused. Memphis watches Red Green??? Man not bad for a Hamiltonian way to go Red Green. I'm guessing you must have a Canadian background.

 

Actually I am desperately trying to write two books... both grisly sci-fi's and one destined to be a graphic novel.

If I ever get around to publishing, I will make oodles of money and mileage and vacuum advance will no longer be issues with me because I'll be rich, and I will also have oodles of Comet parts.

 

that show doesnt come on here lol

 

Never been to Canada, and Red Green doesn't show here, at least not anymore. But years ago I watched it a lot with my dad (also not Canadian) on cable in Jackson, MS where I grew up. Definitely one of the greatest shows ever made.

 

We have Red Green here - I think it's great!

 

Red Green is great. I believe that the nephew is the main nerd from Revenge of the Nerds isn't he?

 

Maybe the price of gas dropped in the second week and your $20 bought a larger quantity of fuel.

 

so whiskey is saying that the gas mileage is directely related to the ugliness\boringness of the vehicle? tuk this may explain the tickets, my ugly looking truck can be in the fast lane faster than traffic and people i pass will speed up and cut traffic to try and pass me and cops will not even look at me. but when i drive the grabber in the slow lane and people are blowing past me in the fast lane i get pulled over and questioned.

 

It's the time factor

Hmm, it is pretty obvious that an engine is going to use more fuel the longer that it is ran.

If Justin covers the measured distance in 20 minutes at 70 mph. It stands to reason that in another test the same measured distance done in 60 minutes, would result in burning fuel for an additional 40 minutes. Fuel savings is right there!

 

You would think that this would work, but it does not. The reason being is that at 70 MPH the engine is burning MORE fuel than at 50 MPH (ie: less efficient). There are many variables here, such as the gear ratio, torque curve, etc. I've heard the same argument against hard vs soft acceleration.

The general rule is a light foot gets the best gas mileage. I'm sure many of us here have a difficult time with a light foot.

When you're afraid of running out of gas, the answer is NOT to hammer it to the gas station as quick as you can but to take it slow and light-footed.

A co-worker and I tested this theory a few years ago. I spent a full gas tank driving to work at 75 MPH with medium accelerations. Then I spent a whole gas tank driving to work at 55 MPH with light accelerations. The proof was on paper. I'll have to find the results (on the PC somewhere), but it was something like 24 the first week and 29 the second week in a 1992 Beretta 3.1 V6. His results were even more impressive in his 1992 Camaro with a 305. Something like 18 the first week and 24 the second. I would have never believe he got 24 MPG out of a V-8 Camaro until I saw it happen.

If you really want to know what yours will do, do the math and put it on paper!

 

Really, it depends on where your car runs at optimum mph at minimum rpm's, and in how you get to that optimum rpm/mph curve. You can burn an awful lot of gas just getting to that optimum curve if you are a lead foot. It can take a lot of miles at that optimum point of driving to get some of your gas mileage back after being a leadfoot.

 

My wife's 07 Mustang V6 has the digital information center in the dash and that has mileage calculation in it. You can hit the reset button and that gives you an instant reading after you let it settle down for a minute or so.

The car did average a little over 27 mpg for a recent 2000 mile trip ... mostly 70-80 mph highway driving. This was calculated the old fashioned way, total miles driven divided by how many gallons of $4 gas purchased for the whole trip. EPA estimates for the car is 28, so pretty much on the money.

Interesting scenarios ...
Driving about 4 car lengths behind a semi truck with him slicing the wind ... instant mpg of 32. This was doing 70 or so. Driving closer did not make a significant difference, so no need to dangerously tailgate a truck, but letting one reduce the wind load on your nose is a good thing.

I got on a long country road with a 45 mph speed limit. I set the cruise control, had it in overdrive, and got an instant reading of 35 mpg!

Sssssh, ... don't tell the feds that .... it was painful to drive that slow for that long. It felt like minutes of my life I would never be able to get back again ...

 

Yeah, everything I said was tongue in cheek. The whole premise of this post is mostly 'off the wall, off topic'. The reasoning and lack of math, makes it all flawed.