Knowing how to improve gas mileage can save your money and needless trips to the gas station, because really who wants to waste their time doing that? The fuel efficiency of your vehicle has many factors that go into it, and you will be surprised at how easy and simple some of these ways to improve gas mileage really are.
Reducing the dependence of fossil fuels in today’s modern vehicle are making hybrids and electric vehicles more and more popular. With gas prices fluctuating more and more each passing year, it can be tough to own a car that’s not great on gas mileage because of the cost of unleaded gasoline.
Some of the best fuel efficient cars of 2015 can boast ranges of 100 mpg and up, now that’s some gas mileage! If you don’t have one of the newer hybrids or electric cars however, this guide shows you the best ways to improve gas mileage for free.
One of the best ways of course to improve gas mileage that isn’t really counted on this list is cleaning your car. Properly washing and waxing your vehicle contributes to the overall aerodynamics of your car and helps maintain inertia.
When gas prices at the pump have you beaten down, just check out these tips to help keep you from wasting money on gas.
Steady on the gas
Believe it or not the biggest factors to improve gas mileage is your right foot. Steady and slow increases in the accelerator pedal can keep your gas mileage at optimum. Avoid harsh stops or sudden starts up to speed that cause your engine to unnecessarily rise in engine speed or RPM.
If you own an automatic transmission equipped vehicle, learn the best way to drive your vehicle by maintaining your engine speed or RPM while driving. Keeping the RPM low and engine load low keeps your gas consumption minimal and saves you money at the gas pump.
Maintenance
You’d be surprised at how much this plays a role into your car’s gas mileage. If your spark plugs are worn, or your distributor is bad, or perhaps even your oil is old and sludgy; all of these can factor into your gas mileage not being what it should.
Instead keep your car running in tip top shape by following your manufacturer guidelines on maintenance and regularly scheduled tasks.
Under Pressure
When your tires are underinflated it will take more energy from your engine to move it, so keep your tires inflated. Anyone that drives with a low pressure tire is only asking to waste precious fuel and put undo stress on your engine.
Keep a notepad handy in your car and record tire pressures regularly to really make sure you are getting the maximum bang for your gas pump buck.
Light as a Feather
The more weight your car carries the harder it has to work to accelerate, causing an adverse effect on your gas mileage and performance. Remove items from your trunk and preventing yourself from pack rat mentality can keep your car clean as well as save your money on gas.
The lighter your vehicle the less gas your car consumes, and if you own a gas guzzler try filling up to just halfway next trip to your gas station. Yes this seems counterintuitive when you want to stop going to the gas station more frequently, and yes this is slightly more work.
But if you consider you are carrying less fuel then you would typically, you are actually saving money by not filling up until the fuel meter is FULL. You are not losing anything other than a few minutes a day by filling up partially, and this amounts to less weight.
Less weight means less wear on your brakes, suspension and subframe components, especially rubber engine mounts. This small step can really save you money and you might be surprised at how effective it really is.
Less Load
Last but definitely not least is accessories, meaning your air conditioning when it comes to ways on how to improve gas mileage. The added drain that your air conditioning compressor creates has an adverse effect on your engine’s power and output. This means it has to work harder and rev higher to get to the same speed it would normally without air conditioning.
Now we all love our creature comforts, but when you can try opening the windows instead of turning on your air conditioning. You’ll see an immediate difference in fuel economy when refraining from air conditioning usage.
Like all things, this too has a negative effect if you want to save money. If you are on the freeway, opening all of your windows will actually increase drag and could become counterintuitive to what you are trying to do.
In the end, just a few simple steps like the ones above can really save you money and time. There’s plenty of ways to improve gas mileage, do you have any suggestions you would like to add? Let us know below!
