How we are saving more than 10% a month on gas for the car

OK, I have to confess. I don’t have an economical car. I drive a Ford Explorer, which is paid for, and I don’t really want to plunk down more money for a car, while this one is still in good running condition. Although, with gas prices being what they are, it is becoming more and more tempting. And no, that is not my Explorer in the picture. Wonder how many miles they get to a bale of hay?

Before gas got so high, I was a bit of an aggressive driver. I drove too fast, and took off too quick at red lights.

My Explorer does have a nice feature on it that will show me the Miles Per Gallon. I can reset it at anytime and it starts over immediately telling me how my gas mileage is. So I tried out several driving habits each time resetting the electronic gizmo to see what I would learn.

Action	Miles Per Gallon
Accelerating quickly from a stop	5
Accelerating moderately from Stop	12
Accelerating while going uphill	12
Holding my speed going uphill	18
Accelerating going down hill	22
Not accelerating going down hill	28 – 35 depending how steep the hill
Driving at 75 MPH	19
Driving at 65 MPH	21
Driving at 60 MPH	22
Using Cruise at 60 MPH	21.5
Idling at the ATM or Fast-Food Drive thru	0
Turning off engine at ATM or Fast-Food drive thru	---not burning gas, save it for later

So these are the things that I learned.

1) Accelerating quickly anytime is not good, unless you are trying to get out of the way of a train. Using a more calm method of starting is much better.

2) Riding your brakes going down hill hurts your efficiency, unless you are speeding or about to rear end someone.

3) Driving along about 60 seemed to give me the best over all gas mileage. If you have a lead foot, try the cruise control if you have it.

4) Ever been in a slow drive thru? You know the person in front seems to have ordered food for all 18 of their relatives. If you have to wait more than a minute, turn off the engine (put it in park). When you are not moving, your MPG is 0. But with the engine off, you have that gas to use after you leave the drive thru.

Out of all of these, the biggest lesson to learn is when you accelerate like you are trying to win the Indy 500, you are not spending your gas wisely. For me, gaining 2 miles per gallon is like getting 10% off at the pump. Since we spend about $400 a month on gas, for us, that comes out to about $40 a month.

Granted, this was not a scientific study, but I can tell the difference when and how often I fill up.

Other lessons we have learned, is to group our trips. Instead of going out multiple times to the grocery store, or the post office, we try to combine a trip with any other errands that we have to do. For us, saving 2 trips a week, will save us 2 gallons of gas. That’s 104 gallons a year, or about $400 a year. However, I don't keep count of these and didn't include them in the $40 in the title of this blog.

The next tip is to use the websites like AtlantaGasPrices.com, or GeorgiaGasPrices.com. You can enter them in the Google search window at the bottom of this blog and find the site easily. Once there, then scroll down and look for “Tell a Friend” on the left hand side. Just above that, you can select your state or metro area for gas prices in your area.

Here is how I use this. When I am getting low on gas, and know that I am going to have to run an errand, I check this website to see who has the cheapest gas near my route. I don’t drive 5 miles out of my way to get gas. I might drive 1 if it is a really good deal and cost effective for me.

This website depends on drivers like you and me to report gas prices. The prices are usually retained on the website for about 36 hours. Also, if you live in a large metro area, it is interesting to see that some areas always seem to have less expensive gas, while others seem to always have the highest prices. Some times one right around the corner will have much cheaper gas, but if you didn't drive by, or know about this website, you would never know.

Using this technique alone usually saves me $.10 to $.20 per gallon. I have it book marked so it only takes me a minute. Also, I have no allegiance to any gas brand, neither does my car. On top of that I use a credit card that will give me either 3% or 5% back on my gas purchase. On the Chase BP card that I have, we let it build up and for a recent trip, I requested the $125 check and got it in two weeks and we used it to help buy gas for our long trip. See my blog “How We Saved Gas Money on our Vacation.”

Let me know if you have any favorite tips that will save gas dollars, just post your comment below.

There is some information at this site, Save Gas Articles, so check it out.

Happy Motoring!!