First long highway trip....
#1
05-10-2004, 07:16 PM
I had a few experiances new to me this weekend in the car. This is only my 3rd or 4th week of owning my car, and its my first hybrid.
My trip was from South Florida about 150 miles north on I-95.
I had it on cruis control almost the entire time.
I did 65 MPH for about 70% of the trip north, and at 70 MPH for the rest.
On the way north I averaged 53.5 mpg, I could have gotten higher but I was testing some things, including tryign to draft behind an 18 wheeler that was doing about 78 MPH, which ionvovled a lot of speeding up and slowing down, etc, and was essentially unsuccessful.
Once off the highway on one a rural 45-55 MPH road I was averaging about 70 MPG. This only lasted for about 9 miles.
While at my destination I got my MPG down to 51.0 while doing short runs showing the car to family and friend and flooring it often when asked how fast it could go.
On the way back South I mileage was much worse. I started doing 70 MPH, but was averaging abotu 47 MPG. I was going more into the wind this time so I assume that was the difference.
The wide was out of the South East both times, and stronger on the way back.
On the way back I finally got some successful drafting done though.
I found an 18 wheeler doing the speed limit (65-60).
I found that there 2 apparently two pockets, 1 that is very close (which is what I was trying to get the first time) and one that is about 4-7 car lengths back (depending on speed). When getting into the 2nd pocket I noticed that almost all the wind noise stopped and my MPG went up by about 15-20 MPG.
When drafting successfully I seemed to be averaging about 65 MPG doing 65 MPH.
I found that there was an area about 1 car length that was a "sweet spot", once out of that the benefit was lost.
When I got off the highway at my destination, was went into light city traffic. When cruising at an steady 45 MPH on flat road with cruis control after coming off the highway, and even after several stop lights, I was consistantly getting 90 MPG (between 85 and 99 MPG).
This was by far the best I had seen like this, but I realized also that wind was out of the East at about 10-15 MPH while I was heading West. I'm still not sure tha fully accounts for it, especially as this was city driving with plenty of obstructions to break up the wind.
I filled up at the beginning of my trip, my round trip was 260 miles.
My tank still read full when I reached by first destination, which I knew had to be wrong. My tank read half full when I got back home and still reads half full today with ~300 miles since my fillup.
I was also curious about the impact of the 99 MPG upper limit in calculations, since when going up a hill the MPG will dip to the 30s or sometimes 20s, but then going down it tops off at 99, which it seems to me would skew calculations.
This tank will likely end up around 51 MPG since the rest of it will be driven out on commuting.
My trip was from South Florida about 150 miles north on I-95.
I had it on cruis control almost the entire time.
I did 65 MPH for about 70% of the trip north, and at 70 MPH for the rest.
On the way north I averaged 53.5 mpg, I could have gotten higher but I was testing some things, including tryign to draft behind an 18 wheeler that was doing about 78 MPH, which ionvovled a lot of speeding up and slowing down, etc, and was essentially unsuccessful.
Once off the highway on one a rural 45-55 MPH road I was averaging about 70 MPG. This only lasted for about 9 miles.
While at my destination I got my MPG down to 51.0 while doing short runs showing the car to family and friend and flooring it often when asked how fast it could go.
On the way back South I mileage was much worse. I started doing 70 MPH, but was averaging abotu 47 MPG. I was going more into the wind this time so I assume that was the difference.
The wide was out of the South East both times, and stronger on the way back.
On the way back I finally got some successful drafting done though.
I found an 18 wheeler doing the speed limit (65-60).
I found that there 2 apparently two pockets, 1 that is very close (which is what I was trying to get the first time) and one that is about 4-7 car lengths back (depending on speed). When getting into the 2nd pocket I noticed that almost all the wind noise stopped and my MPG went up by about 15-20 MPG.
When drafting successfully I seemed to be averaging about 65 MPG doing 65 MPH.
I found that there was an area about 1 car length that was a "sweet spot", once out of that the benefit was lost.
When I got off the highway at my destination, was went into light city traffic. When cruising at an steady 45 MPH on flat road with cruis control after coming off the highway, and even after several stop lights, I was consistantly getting 90 MPG (between 85 and 99 MPG).
This was by far the best I had seen like this, but I realized also that wind was out of the East at about 10-15 MPH while I was heading West. I'm still not sure tha fully accounts for it, especially as this was city driving with plenty of obstructions to break up the wind.
I filled up at the beginning of my trip, my round trip was 260 miles.
My tank still read full when I reached by first destination, which I knew had to be wrong. My tank read half full when I got back home and still reads half full today with ~300 miles since my fillup.
I was also curious about the impact of the 99 MPG upper limit in calculations, since when going up a hill the MPG will dip to the 30s or sometimes 20s, but then going down it tops off at 99, which it seems to me would skew calculations.
This tank will likely end up around 51 MPG since the rest of it will be driven out on commuting.
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