Recently I came across an offbeat proposal for saving gas when one drives: Coasting. The author (whom I can’t remember now) noted how he (pretty sure it was a he) has been letting off the gas pedal and coasting down hills for a while now, and has seen a modest but real decrease in his fuel consumption.
The idea intrigued me, and I tried it out. The driving I do, primarily at nonrush hours on gently undulating back roads, is well-suited to such an experiment, offering a plethora of opportunities and a paucity of other drivers I might inconvenience by failing to put the pedal to the metal at all times.
Well, whaddaya know – when you look for them, there are lots and lots of coasting spots. Doesn’t have to be a steep slope; even a gentle decline works just fine. Doesn’t have to be a long stretch; even a few dozen yards here and there will add up over time to a respectable total. It’s surprising how slowly the car’s speed will slow even on a near-flat surface, and how far inertia will carry one beyond the base of a respectable hill before mere gravity gives not enough go. It’s become a game for me now, seeing how many times on each drive the coast is clear.
And it’s so easy, such a small maneuver; just lift one’s foot ever so slightly, just clear of the pedal, poised for the soft descent that will initiate a smooth surge of acceleration when it’s needed. Smooth – that’s the ticket. Smooth is good; smooth acceleration (and deceleration, for that matter) burns less gas than stomping on pedal and brake.
I haven’t been paying sufficient attention to my gas mileage to note what sort of fuel savings this is achieving, in part because my little Scion’s fuel economy is so good anyway that it’s not much of an issue for me. What I have noticed as a benefit is the psychic gain: Not just, not even primarily the small glow of satisfaction at conserving energy, but rather the smoothing away of stress. Coasting, I find, is calming. Easing off the pedal eases off whatever tension I happen to be carrying. Coasting creates a relaxed focus on the now of driving, an enhanced awareness of the terrain I traverse.
Oh, yes, it’s a whole thing, called hypermiling, and involves all sorts of little strategies to save gas. Some people really go to an extreme with it and they have clubs. The superstars of these clubs claim to get upwards of 100 mpg! It can involve dangerous and/or inconvenient driving moves, so definitely not for everybody.
My little Accord is so lightweight that it doesn’t even coast very far once you take your foot off the pedal, so I can’t do much but every little bit helps.
Er… I don’t get it. Isn’t that just normal driving? I thought this was going to be about popping the car into neutral on hills or something (not to be recommended), but simply letting off the gas is what you do going downhill, isn’t it?
Is this a bit like, “Hey, I’ve discovered this really cool thing - using your brakes to stop!” or am I missing something obvious?
If you’re going down any reasonable hill, you’ll likely be coasting anyway. :dubious:
Yes and no on “normal driving,” I’d say, at least for me. Yes to backing off the gas pedal on respectable hills, but I’m speaking of any descending roadway, no matter how meager the slope, where before I’d ease up but still have some pressure on the pedal. Now, in deliberate pursuit of coasting, I’m releasing all contact with the gas far more often. If the gradient’s even barely enough to get a marble rolling, it’s worth trying out.
Heck, you can even coast upgradient for a bit, say coming off a turn if you carry a bit more speed than you normally would through the curve and it’s a slight slope. Or say you’ve accelerated up a hill; when you get to where the road levels out, pick your foot up off the pedal and let 'er glide.
Hey, I’ve been doing this recently too. The reason is that I’m occasionally driving – temporarily – an old Cadillac, an extreme gas guzzler. Inside it constantly tells me my gas mileage. Frighteningly, it often shows such horrifying numbers as “6” or “8” (miles to the gallon). To try to rectify that, I’ve taken to coasting and I love seeing how high I can make it go. I don’t drive it enough to notice if I’m spending less on gas, but it has to help a little bit. Usually I try to avoid driving it, but it’s a car we are storing for a friend and we only have one car so every once in awhile I need to use it.
I’m with The Loaded Dog - I’ve been doing this all my life.
Probably because I learned to drive on a stick shift, and most of the cars I’ve owned were/are stick.
I get 35 mpg out of my old Civic doing this. My CRV, not so good - maybe 23. 25 on the Natchez Trace, where the speed limit is 50 and I can set the cruise control.
It could be but there are geeks, psychopaths, and dorks in these pursuits like anything else. Some strategies are downright irresponsible and dangerous. Drafting behind 18 wheelers at close range saves gas but it is dangerous as hell once certain people get hold of this knowledge. Mythbusters measured the savings of drafting behind 18 wheelers down to a 2 foot distance. Normal people would just think that is interesting but the obsessive compulsive among us have competitions either with themselves or other people like them. During a burst of insanity, they might just decide to try their hand at drafting 2 feet away just like they saw on TV and not only put themselves in danger but also everyone else around them.
Another strategy is to turn your ignition off and your transmission in neutral when going down hills which can be used for coasting as described. This is completely irresponsible and dangerous as all hell too. It will turn off power steering and brakes at the very least and it is easily possible to lock up the steering wheel with no way recover during unexpected circumstances. I have tried that as an experiment a few times over the years on deserted roads and it is truly dangerous.
If someone pulled that crap with me in the vehicle or, even worse, my family, I would do everything in my power to get us all out of the vehicle no matter where we are. That is dangerous stunt driving which would be fine on a rented track but, on regular roads, there are innocent people around that should never have to deal with people that could collide with a vehicle spinning out of control by slamming into an 18 wheeler or dealing with a car with partially disabled steering or brakes.
My car is only 4cyl and my commute is ten - fifteen minutes, and I don’t drive much else these days, so fuel prices aren’t biting me that hard yet, but sometimes on my way home I will coast up to a red light from quite a long way away, because I know the light cycle. But it’s not always possible to do stuff like this. I certainly wouldn’t do it in the daytime because of the traffic. It weirds out other drivers (and annoys them if they don’t understand I’m not slowing them down in the long run), who expect me to drive up close to the lights and then decelerate harder. So I might save a few cents, but I only have to be rear-ended once, and that’s a lot of fuel I need to save to cover the repairs.
So, if the OP is talking about a matter of degree, then yeah ok. But there’s not a lot of room between regular (not thinking about the gas) driving, and the sort of dangerous and obsessive stuff Shagnasty outlined. This narrow margin would probably be a matter of just trying to drive a bit more smoothly, which I try to do anyway these days (I think most guys over 30 tend towards this, and nearly all women). Luckily, I had my V8 and my hormones when fuel was cheap!
Yes, the coasting I’m talking about is in that range of safety between mindless driving and ultramiling. As I said in the OP, where and when I normally drive, I don’t often have to worry about inconveniencing and/or enraging other drivers. If I do have someone impatient on my tail, I’ll pull over and let them by rather than frustrate them into rashness.
I’ve always tended toward smooth driving, but since taking up the coasting mindset, I find my driving is even more so.
If a car were to drive into the back of a transport, it would be best if the car had been following as closely as possible, so that the speed difference at the time of impact would be as minimal as possible.
Of course the best approach by far would be to follow well back so that any collision could be avoided.
This really comes down to trying to not use your brakes. But don’t piss off the people around you. The elevation difference between home and work is a 2200 feet. So I do a lot of this.
I just had Nissan do a once over on my SUV before my 36,000 mile warranty was up. Brakes are fine. Only about half way worn. It should be noted that most of my miles are nearly vacant 2 lane highway. But, I have a lot of switch backs to deal with where speed needs to be down to about 20 mph. The speed limit on the road is 50mph tops.
I also thought this was standard practice. But it’s much, much harder to do in the city.
I get 27mpg going to work. And 16 going home. It works out in the end, but it is a good idea to not charge into corners and brake for them when going down hill. Coast when you can.
There are several places on the way to work where I can shift into neutral and coast for almost a mile. I don’t really see the argument that being in neutral is dangerous. If there is much traffic around maybe, but as long as your engine isn’t prone to stall I can stop just fine (actually my Mazdaspeed3 can stop 60-0 in 116 feet!) and if I need to accelerate I’m 1/2 second from being in gear anyway.
By the way kids, don’t turn your engine off while moving, or your steering wheel will lock (theft deterrant measure on most cars) and your brakes become very very difficult to press (no power boost.)
I don’t recall the exact numbers, but I was able to go from something like 315 miles per tank up to 350 when I was driving very carefully and coasting a lot. This was on a 98 Contour with the 2.5 V6 and 5-speed manual.
“Us” should be “We”. The test of this is to delete “manual transmission drivers”. You wouldn’t say, “Us have been doing that…”, would you?
