Is driving for maximum mpg worth the trouble?

I'm not sure oil comes from fossils. Are you?

 

I don't know exactly the reason for the question, but it prompts a couple from me:

Let's just say we don't know that oil comes from fossils. Does that make some difference? Do you think there is some indication that oil is something which is under current and constant creation within the Earth?

 

Are you an abiogenic believer or are you just playing semantics with the word "fossil"?

 

If you were mainly a freeway driver I could see the comparison making sense for sure.

 

Hi WP...,

But with banks giving 2 % interest, hypermiling does better well up to about 60 mpg. Somebody driving a 60 mpg vehicle , can hypermile up to about 70 mpg with some practice. That is is a consumption improvement of 14 %. You ain't goin to get that interest, even from Bernie Madoff!!

 

Move to the UK and you can have bigger gallons.
Will that help?

 

I'm the type who prefers to view the chart like this (35 mpg marked in red, and graph extended to 100 mpg):

 

As an added bonus the fuel is much more expensive, last week a litre of petrol was 100.9 pence (minimum), so an Imperial Gallon would costs approx.

4.59 GBP = 7.48 USD = 8.68 CAD = 9.28 AUD.

If the UK used the US Gallon the cost would be approx.

3.82GBP = 6.22 USD = 7.23 CAD = 7.72 AUD

 

Is driving for maximum mpg worth the trouble?

--
yes i like it.

 

What is the measure of worth?
Is it cost?
Is it being a more observant driver?
Is it being more relaxed even if you arrive a little while after a more aggressive driver?
Is it taking satisfaction in winding up that tail gating car behind you by sticking to or just slightly below the speed limit? (once they get past you, you know the odds are that you'll drift up behind them at the next set of lights anyway).

 

i turn the question around

if i am at 45, i ask myself "someone is offering me "X" to mod my behavior to get to 55 - shall i take the payment?"

in my case, at 20K miles/year and $2.50 per gallon

this is a real world situation. i sold my chevy avalanche suv at 15 mpgs (long story, wife nixed me getting a motorcycle at 40 so the avalanche was my reaction) in favor of a used gen 1 that got 45 mpgs for me when i got in it.

at 20K miles and 2.50 per gallon, that switch saved me $2,222 annualized.

i was being "offered" another $202 per year to learn how to increase the mpgs from 45 to 55. i accepted.

At $4 per, i was making $3,556 annualized avalanche over gen I at 45, and an additional $323 per year to improve to 55.

in that the 02 prius cost me 13K in 05 and is worth 6K now, i spent 7K on the car, plus 2k maintenance (front pads, rotors turned, reg battery, and new oil pan (juffy lube!!!). 9K cost, about 9K saved in gas (at 45).

so in a twisted way i have driven the last four and half years for "free" when compared to the avalanche ownership

like most of us (and jeez i said most not all) i did NOT have a need for the 7,000 pound beast that was the avalanche

 

Numerically, there is always a reduction in % gained when the "step"
is constant:

30 - 35 is a 16.7% improvement
35 - 40 is a 14.3% improvement
and so on...
50 - 55 is a 10% improvement, etc.

While the gain lets say in dollars not spent -- and perhaps saved --
steadily decreases at each step, I would argue strongly that the
opposite is true for the sense of satisfaction, achievement, happiness,
and even self-worth. It is an inverse relationship. It goes up more and
more as each step is successively more difficult to achieve. We're
talking about achievements at the top of Maslow's hierarchy here. This
is where life, or at least a few minutes a day of life, is good indeed.
This I think is "worth the trouble."

It seems that the OP finds striving for the highest possible FE/MPGs is
somehow a burden. It is as if the mental energy needed to be put to
the task is sorely missed when taken from some other tasks.

What might those tasks be?

I would trust that we are not talking about those tasks necessarily
connected with the safe and prudent operation of a motor vehicle such
as:
* observing traffic and road conditions,
* estimating rates of closing and opening with other vehicles,
* looking for incoming/crossing vehicles,
* judging time and distances to stop lights and signs, speed bumps,
* etc.

In fact, when pushing for FE/MPGs well above the EPA estimates for
any vehicle, you have to do increasingly better at being aware of and
reacting to these conditions. For the most part, you are a safer driver.
And this is not "worth the trouble?"

So, the activities from which the increased effort must be diverted are
something else that people do while driving. Those might include:
* talking on a cell phone
* text messaging
* eating and drinking
* shaving
* putting on make-up
* brushing hair
* changing clothes
* holding/petting a pet
* disciplining children in the back seat
* exchanging physical intimacies with a passenger

These are things that you're not supposed to be doing while driving in
the first place. If expending mental energies on getting better
FE/MPGs and being a better driver results in a reduction or cessation
of any these activities that surely is a good thing, and most definitely
is "worth the trouble."

The fact that you're also saving some doe-ray-me and polluting less
are nice additional benefits and also "worth the trouble." :cheer2: