Thursday, June 26, 2008
How Many Hypermiles Are in a Lightyear?
One of the things that I love about the English language is that it's a technical language, so new words can be created from old ones on an as-needed basis. For example, take "hyper" + "mile" and make it into a verb. The gerund form of it would be "hypermiling", which has recently entered the lexicon as "increasing your car's gas mileage by changing your driving habits".
Examples of hypermiling practices include accelerating and decelerating more slowly (0 to sixty in twenty seconds as opposed to, I dunno, 5) or turning your car all the way off if you're going to sit at a stoplight for more than thirty seconds, or finally cleaning all that junk out of your back seat.
The overall vibe of hypermiling websites seems to be that aggressive driving is inefficient. The farther down you push the pedal, the more gas you use. So telling people that they can save money by chilling out at the wheel is a good thing, right?
Mostly. Hypermiling is not without defect.
First, some of the things they tell you are slightly questionable. Run your engine filled up to the "low" oil mark. Fill your tires to their maximum pressure rather than their recommended pressure. These sort of things can't be good for the life of the car, and is it possible that you increase the risk of a blowout by running your tires to so high? Wouldn't that be more expensive than the gas you save?
Second, some of the hypermiling suggestions are extremely questionable. Drafting behind semi trucks, for example, is not safe, even though it allows you to go for miles and miles without actually using your accelerator. Turning the car off while coasting down hills--also dangerous (since steering wheels frequently lock if the car is turned off). In the interest of full disclosure, I'll add that most hypermiling sites don't list theses two, and the ones that do list them explain that they're less-than-ideal from a safety perspective.
Third, it's highly possible that the culture of hypermiling has only sprung up to sell MPG meters.
And finally, it's totally geared towards non-commercial driving. Okay, it's true, hypermiling.com offers training for commercial drivers (at $210 a pop), but you can't very well shut your diesel off at a stop light. The problem is that hypermiling requires a fair amount of individual effort, and it's a lot easier to justify that effort when the gas is coming from your own pocketbook. So you can train your drivers to hypermile, but will they actually do it? In my experience, it's hard enough to make your drivers drive their routes without taking creative detours, let alone micro-manage how far down they press the gas pedal.
If you're looking to save some gas money, or want another metric to out-elite your buddies who drive hybrids, then hypermile away. Just don't draft behind me or blow a tire next to me! If you have a fleet, and you want to save gas money, better to track routes using GPS.
I'm just sayin'.
FoxTrax GPS Fleet Tracking
Clever solutions for vehicle tracking
www.FoxTraxGPS.com
Examples of hypermiling practices include accelerating and decelerating more slowly (0 to sixty in twenty seconds as opposed to, I dunno, 5) or turning your car all the way off if you're going to sit at a stoplight for more than thirty seconds, or finally cleaning all that junk out of your back seat.
The overall vibe of hypermiling websites seems to be that aggressive driving is inefficient. The farther down you push the pedal, the more gas you use. So telling people that they can save money by chilling out at the wheel is a good thing, right?
Mostly. Hypermiling is not without defect.
First, some of the things they tell you are slightly questionable. Run your engine filled up to the "low" oil mark. Fill your tires to their maximum pressure rather than their recommended pressure. These sort of things can't be good for the life of the car, and is it possible that you increase the risk of a blowout by running your tires to so high? Wouldn't that be more expensive than the gas you save?
Second, some of the hypermiling suggestions are extremely questionable. Drafting behind semi trucks, for example, is not safe, even though it allows you to go for miles and miles without actually using your accelerator. Turning the car off while coasting down hills--also dangerous (since steering wheels frequently lock if the car is turned off). In the interest of full disclosure, I'll add that most hypermiling sites don't list theses two, and the ones that do list them explain that they're less-than-ideal from a safety perspective.
Third, it's highly possible that the culture of hypermiling has only sprung up to sell MPG meters.
And finally, it's totally geared towards non-commercial driving. Okay, it's true, hypermiling.com offers training for commercial drivers (at $210 a pop), but you can't very well shut your diesel off at a stop light. The problem is that hypermiling requires a fair amount of individual effort, and it's a lot easier to justify that effort when the gas is coming from your own pocketbook. So you can train your drivers to hypermile, but will they actually do it? In my experience, it's hard enough to make your drivers drive their routes without taking creative detours, let alone micro-manage how far down they press the gas pedal.
If you're looking to save some gas money, or want another metric to out-elite your buddies who drive hybrids, then hypermile away. Just don't draft behind me or blow a tire next to me! If you have a fleet, and you want to save gas money, better to track routes using GPS.
I'm just sayin'.
FoxTrax GPS Fleet Tracking
Clever solutions for vehicle tracking
www.FoxTraxGPS.com
Labels: business, GPS, technology
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