Fuel Saving - Can you do it?

I love driving! I do a lot of it and think of it as one of the greatest gifts of freedom you can give to a human being. I have driving licences for Car (B), Motorcycle (A), Lorry (C+E) and Tracked (H), I can remember the feeling I had when I passed each of the driving tests, and I also remember the sheer disappointment when I failed my car & motorcycle test first time around! The car test involved a ‘racing line’ through a roundabout which the instructor did not think was suitable during a driving test. The motorcycle test involved a ‘U’ turn in the narrowest road in Wellingborough; I executed a ‘3 point turn’ manoeuvre, which again the instructor didn’t think was suitable. Anyway, an exam is an exam and I failed them. I took my car test 2 days later and passed and had to wait 6 weeks before I could get another motorcycle test. The next test was in Bedford and again I had to complete the ‘U’ turn, this time I can only use the word ‘ runway’ to describe the width of the road to complete the exercise! Needless to say I passed this one with flying colours.

Like I said, I love driving, I drive on average 700 miles a week, mostly motorway, but I can change the route and go cross country. I don’t drive particularly fast or aggressively, but I do like to make good progress (remember this from your driving test?) and maintain a good speed. Maintaining a good speed on the twisty B roads on the way home is particularly enjoyable. I usually abandon the motorway 2 or 3 times a week in favour of the B roads.

“Wonderful”, I hear you say, “what’s this got to do with the price of bread”? Well, I shall tell you. Fuel! Petrol, diesel, benzine, gas, motion potion, whatever you want to call it, it’s expensive, and I’m getting a little tired of paying for it! Last week I decided to start doing something about it, if you follow me on twitter @CarrStuart or #ecostu you will have been able to follow my progress. If you didn’t, no problem, I’ll summarise here.

Vehicle of choice – 2009 Audi A3, 2.0Tdi (140hp), 70,000 miles. Goodyear Efficient Grip tyres and red paint (although I don’t think that’s relevant).

Now, I did an advanced driving course in 1998 so I dug deep into the ‘grey matter’ and tried to recall what I was taught. I must have remembered some of it because I saved some cash at the end of the week, more of that later. One of the key parts of the course was to drive defensively, in my mind this means reading the road, planning well ahead and thinking what other road users are doing or about to do. As the week progressed I realised that other road users were causing me to use a lot of fuel. I found that if I used the offside lane on the motorway, the fast one, I got sucked into keeping up with the traffic. What I mean is that I mirrored what everyone else did in that lane. I began to notice a pattern; upwards of 70mph (indicated, to allow for speedo error), down to 60, up to 70+, back down to 60. This is exactly the type of driving I was trying to avoid. Accelerating then slowing down does not produce great fuel returns. So very quickly I stopped using the ‘fast’ lane. “Drive on the left” was the first thing that my driving instructor said to me, so that’s what I started to do. It amazes me how many people do not use the nearside lane, the slow one; actually the speed limit is the same in this lane as the rest of the motorway, lane hoggers take note!

This was the place to be, it allowed me to plan well ahead and make the best use of the road. Using the tips below, I found I could make good progress and maintain a constant speed, when I needed to overtake I left plenty of time and made the best use of all lanes to get past without altering speed.

Like I said the majority of driving is on the motorway and I did sacrifice my B road journeys this week. I also used the train one day, this was great but the short trip to the train station only returned 46.5mpg. I also had some traffic jams to contend with, which didn’t help. Over the whole week I managed to achieve the following results:

Distance - 621 Miles

Average Speed - 46 mph

Average fuel consumption - 57mpg

I compared this with my normal speed and mpg (46 mph & 48mpg) , and I managed to get an additional 9mpg over the week by driving carefully without sacrificing any average speed. In money terms I saved almost £13 and completed my journeys in the same time, this would translate into an annual saving (45 working weeks) of £580. RESULT!

Can I keep it up? I must admit, it was more of a challenge during the first week and something to keep me occupied. I will try to keep it up, but I fear the novelty will wear off. The motorway scenario was very easy to achieve but I do miss the country road trip on the way home. This is guaranteed to use more fuel, but I shall definitely make a compromise so I still get to enjoy the pleasures of driving.

My top tips for efficient driving:

Vehicle:
1. Tyres – Make sure they are inflated to the correct pressure. Check wheel alignment is correct.
2. Engine – Make sure engine oil is at the correct level.
3. AirCon – Try not to use it! If you have climate control, make sure it doesn’t come on automatically.
4. Reduce drag – Get that roof box, and rails off. Keep the windows closed on the fast roads too.

Driving style:
1. Maintain a constant speed where possible.
2. Avoid harsh acceleration.
3. Use the engines torque, change gear lower down the rev range.
4. Plan well ahead when manoeuvring.
5. Don’t coast in neutral; you will use more fuel than if it were in gear.
6. Use the gradients to help you. Don’t accelerate so hard down hills and plan in advance to save you accelerating up them.

I would advise that you give it go, without too much effort you should be able to save a bit of cash (and do a tiny bit to reduce your carbon footprint).

All the best

Stuart