10 Ways to Save on Fuel

 

 

Fuel is an ever increasing commodity and has been a pain point for the common man. With government not bringing in any effective policies to curb the soaring price, common man is trying to find ways to save a few pennies on fuel by using it very efficiently. Recent hike to 6 per liter will drill holes in your wallet.  Here are some ways you can save your fuel as well as money.

1. Brake the right way

An auto consumes most of the fuel when it accelerates but a moving car doesn’t need much of it to keep moving. This means in order to improve your mileage you need to keep the ride smooth. So always pay attention to the cars in front of you so that you can anticipate well when to slightly ease your pace. This will let you maintain your momentum when you hit the brakes. This is the most efficient way to save fuel in heavy traffic and this process will easily get you 10 percent to 20 percent fuel mileage. You should also avoid quick acceleration and hard braking as well.

2. Use Cruise Control

If your car is outfitted with cruise control, then you should definitely use it if you are struck in less traffic. It keeps your speed constant. In this way you can save a lot of fuel. Cruise system is a system that automatically controls the speed of a motor vehicle. Using cruise control will moderate your speed and will prevent you from accelerating too much. You can also use the overdrive gears which will generally keep your RPM down and your wallet happy.

3. Shift to Neutral When Still

While idling at a traffic signal, shift into neutral. This reduces the transmission strain and gives the transmission a minimal time to cool down. You can also try avoiding idling. Even burning a gallon of fuel, in idle mode will make no sense as it will not let you travel a single mile.  Try to avoid keeping your car in a idle mode while you are whiling away your time peeking at your neighbors’ car.

4. Drop Extra Weight

The heavier the car is, the more fuel it takes to run. Remove the unused extra weight from your car. Force equals to mass, time and acceleration, so you shouldn’t accelerate your car much. You can always keep you vehicle light by removing the accessories like heavy seat covers made up of wooden beads, or you can keep off your car from spare tire, roof racks, carriers or car lift. Every extra 50 kg apart from the car capacity will increase your fuel consumption by 2 percent.

5. Pick the Best Route

If your travelling involves too much of traffic signals, then this might not be the most fuel-efficient route. Stopping at every signal for a minute, only means more fuel consumption. So you should pick the best short route which will have less traffic and pit stops as well. Be wise when you pick your route.

6. Turn off the AC

We all know this fact that running the air conditioner impacts our car’s overall fuel efficiency, but tend to ignore it for our comfort. If you can bear the cost, then carry on, but if you want to save money then try to do away with the air conditioner. Try not to turn it on, but turn it off 5-10 minutes before reaching your destination. You can always park your car in the shade, so that your car doesn’t have to work hard to get cool.

7. Remove Your Ski Rack

Unless you are using ski, bicycle or luggage rack, but have them on your car roof, then don’t carry them always. You must remove those, as they increase the wind resistance on your car which ultimately results in more fuel consumption. Inflate your tires to a specified level like 0.2 PSI or above. This will reduce the contact area between your tire and the road, and thus the friction will also decrease. It will help you slightly to improve gas mileage.

8. Carpool

Carpooling is sharing of car journeys where more than one person shares their journey and travels together. By sharing and having more people in the car reduces individual travel costs such as fuel costs, tolls, and the stress of driving. Last but not the least – It also reduces the fuel consumption. The quantity of fuel user per person is halved each time you carpool with a companion. Carpooling is also foreseen as more environment friendly and sustainable way to travelling as it reduces less emission of carbon.

9. Check your Air Filter

An Air Filter is an essential part of a car’s intake system, as the car engine ‘breaths’ through the air filter. Its purpose is to filter out the dirt and other foreign particles in the air ands preventing them from entering the engine which can possibly damage it. The air filter should be replaced regularly. Doing so, you can improve your car’s fuel mileage by 10 percent.

10. Drive slower

We all are not fond off being a slow driver but this is s proven fact that driving fast increases the turbulence and eventually the fuel consumption also increases. So try to be a slow driver, you will end up saving fuel. If you try this process and reduce your speed by five miles per hour, then you will reduce the fuel consumption by 7 percent.