ss_blog_claim=bf53c2c2a6b5e4b759eb9b46babec032 Stephen the dog: Hyper MIling?

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Hyper MIling?


As we all know gas prices are shooting way up. Man is that stuff expensive. However I am not going to complain about it, nope not me. I don’t want to become another victim of big oil and find myself in a bag full of wet cats somewhere in the east river. We all know what happened to that lady who figured out how to run a car on water.

Today I want to talk about the trend of hypermiling. Hypermilers believe that if you drive carefully you can get 30-50% better gas mileage. While this may be true if you typically accelerate to 120mph between stop lights and then slam on your brakes and skid to a stop, is it not likely. As a dog I love the car but sudden stops tend to slam my head into the windshield and I fall off the seat. I don’t enjoy that.

The problem is now that the media is all over gas prices we are seeing stories about these people who are driving to get the best possible gas mileage out of their cars. People better gas mileage is good but you can take it too far. Coasting for 2 miles into a red light or driving 20mph under the speed limit will save gas. Going 0-30 in 5 mins will also save gas. However all the money you save on gas will end up going to auto body repair.

The best example of hypermilers is perhaps old ladies in Buicks. We have all seen the white hair sticking over the steering wheel of the car slowly meandering along without a care in the world. These people really know how to get the best mileage. Ever wonder why the crouch down so low behind the wheel. Wind resistance my friend. Why do they tend to swerve back and forth across the lane? They are just following the topographic contours on the road so that they can go downhill as much as possible. Sure it is going to take granny 3 hours to get to the store but she is going to get 30% better gas mileage than you.

For Granny this is all good. We cut old people a lot of slack because they are nice and make cookies and give out dog treats. However with gas prices so high more and more people are starting to drive like granny and that is not good. Although you may love Grannies cookies I am pretty sure you don’t want to drive behind her. Think about spending your entire commute stuck behind a huge pack of old people.

I suggest moderation. The way to tell if you are driving properly is to let yours dog help you. That’s right among other things we know the best way to drive. Put you dog in the front seat and start driving. If you dog keeps falling off the seat and hitting with windshield you are stopping and starting to quickly smooth out that acceleration and save some gas. If your dog jumps out of the car window you are driving to slow speed it up. If you dog has his head out the window with his tongue hanging out you are doing all right keep it up. If for some reason you don’t have a dog get off the road and go get a dog there is no way you can live a full and happy life without a dog. Even if you think you are happy you are just kidding yourself and no you can no substitute your cat for a dog. There is simply no reason to own a cat other. The only thing cats are good for is chasing.

1 Comments:

At May 5, 2008 at 5:53:00 AM EST , Anonymous Anonymous said...

http://blogs.wsj.com/buzzwatch/2008/05/02/jargon-tracker-here-comes-the-%e2%80%98memristor%e2%80%99-interest-in-%e2%80%98hypermiling%e2%80%99/?mod=WSJBlog

 

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