"Drafting" experiment... 50 mpg to 65 mpg, easy!

Re: "Drafting" experiment... 50 mpg to 65 mpg, eas

At one point several years ago, I was thinking about getting a Honda Insight. The newsgroup I monitored discussed several techniques like that. They also noticed mpg improvements by positioning themselves on the crest of the air flow disturbance. I think the guy who wrote about it referred to it as surfing.

 

It works. I stay back about one second and get results of around 52 MPG at 77 mph.

BTW get ready to be scolded by others. Scolding yourself first won't help.

 

I used to do this all the time when on 101. The only drawback is that if the highway isn't clean, you be getting little rock chips in the very front part of your car and not know it. You can hear little pebbles when they hit the hood, b ut not the lower front area. my car is pretty chipped up

 

great results!!... try drafting in a F-150... you will double your mileage. and in isolated areas, drafting behind a professional driver is not as dangerous or difficult as driving with idiots under any circumstances imho.

 

Evan:

I suppose the neat thing about your line of work is that on an almost daily basis you get to see Darwinism in action.

Jay

 

The best way to do this is to mount a HV battery-powered electromagnet to the front bumper or your Prius. On the highway, creep up behind a large truck until your front bumper is almost touching the rear bumper of the truck, then engage the electromagnet.

 

well i dont recommend drafting to anyone... but i realize that a truck will not be able to stop faster i do so that a following distance of one second will be good enough.

obviously i will be paying extra attention to what the truck is doing and i dont do it when others are in the car not so much out of concern for their well-being. its more like, i dont want to listen to them b**ing about my driving.

 

Re: "Drafting" experiment... 50 mpg to 65 mpg, eas

I draft as much as I can about 1.5 car lengths behind any car.

One thing to remember, EVEN IF the truck/car in front of you can't stop any faster than you IT STILL CAN if it HITS something.

So, I try keep an eye on the car in front of the car I'm following (if I can, damn trucks and tinted windows) in order to get more reaction time.

So, something I learned driving up and down the insane section of the 5 near the 710 where all the slow traffic is on the LEFT.

Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

 

Typical reaction times are 1/2 second. My usual following distance is 2 seconds. At that distance people will regularly cut in and reduce mine and theirs to less than 1 second in less predictable traffic patterns than driving the interstate behind a tractor trailer rig. The stopping distance for one of those big rigs is twice that of the Prius. If the truck hit something, it would probably not reduce it's stopping distance as it would drive the other vehicle and would likely lose control of it's own braking system.

In any event, the scary story you told has little to do with this, other than involving an 18 wheel truck. Can you share any details of the causes of the accident. Unfortunately, 19 year olds use judgement that is beyond our capacity to explain. I can't explain the things I did at that age.

If what I was doing was dangerous, then driving in rush hour traffic should never be done. I think it may sound worse than it is.

 

I try to avoid drafting behind any trucks that have sub-par mud flaps, if I draft at all. It seems that most of the trucks in this area do not drive consistent speeds (or drive too fast), so drafting tends to be unproductive in many cases.

 

i have to agree with Ray. in my area during rush hour traffic, nearly every day i will see a line of 3-5 cars or more all bumper to bumper in the fast lane travelling 65 mph (reason is obvious... they all want to go faster than 65 except for the guy at the head of the line) average following distance can be as little as 20 feet. in that scenario, being able to see around the cars in front of you is not enough. your foot wouldnt even have touched the brake by the time you hit the car in front of you.

i will say that in my experience, many truckers if they are in a position where they dont think drafting is safe, they will let you know. if that happens, back off. but i have seen truckers drafting each other. the one benefit of drafting is that even the frontman gets better mileage too because the following truck will eliminate the rear end downdraft and turbulence so can benefit from it.

 

Yeah, around here following too close to a semi is the best way to get a rock in the windshield. I try to keep at least 5 secs behind a large truck.

I usually stay in the slow lane of a divided highway, and if some a**hole wants to pass, let him pass. I've never been a Speedy Gonzales and sure won't start at my age.

If some a** still tries to tailgate me, I just use the cruise lever to gradually decrease my speed in 1 km/h increments until he gets the idea and passes. Idiots. They're the ones that cause accidents too.