Cost of Petrol?

[qigong chimp]

Petrol will be priced something like right when burning it is no longer deemed a reasonable way of moving empty seats around the country; when the sight of a car with driver only in it is startling.
>/= 98% of vehicles arriving at my employer's HQ (car park capacity 700) are single occupant. When </= 2% are single occupant we'll be getting there.

 

[Unkraut]

With the camper we've stripped unnecessary weight and dropped the motorway cruise control from 70 to 60mph and gained about 5mpg which is around 15%

The 'rules' taught were, apart from keeping top speed down a bit, get out of first gear as soon as possible, use the over-run cut off by staying in gear but foot off the accelerator (downhill or approaching junctions), use cruise control, and above all tyre pressures. The rule they said was car manufacturer's pressure fully laden plus 0.2 bar. On my own car this doesn't work as the gap is too great, so instead of 2.4 bar I run it with 2.5 front about 2.7 at the back, and a bit more when fully laden for holidays. You can save up to 12% fuel with extra pressure. If you overdo it you lose traction so some experimenting is called for.

When I bought my car - Citroen of course, like the best - both measurements had 6.1 litres per 100 km, and I have consistently managed to get the usage down to 4.8 litres. And I don't always drive that slowly!

An enormous amount of fuel is wasted by driving fast up hills. Common sense - slower up (90) and faster down (140)!

 

[Fab Foodie]

The 'rules' taught were, apart from keeping top speed down a bit, get out of first gear as soon as possible, use the over-run cut off by staying in gear but foot off the accelerator (downhill or approaching junctions), use cruise control, and above all tyre pressures. The rule they said was car manufacturer's pressure fully laden plus 0.2 bar. On my own car this doesn't work as the gap is too great, so instead of 2.4 bar I run it with 2.5 front about 2.7 at the back, and a bit more when fully laden for holidays. You can save up to 12% fuel with extra pressure. If you overdo it you lose traction so some experimenting is called for.

When I bought my car - Citroen of course, like the best - both measurements had 6.1 litres per 100 km, and I have consistently managed to get the usage down to 4.8 litres. And I don't always drive that slowly!

An enormous amount of fuel is wasted by driving fast up hills. Common sense - slower up (90) and faster down (140)!

We were taught the same on corporate 'driving awareness courses'. It's all stuff that works, but a little patience is required :-)

 

[Mr Celine]

An enormous amount of fuel is wasted by driving fast up hills. Common sense - slower up (90) and faster down (140)!

It takes the same amount of energy to raise the mass of your car by a certain height no matter how fast or slowly you raise it.
Going up hill slowly will use less energy due to the reduction in wind resistance.

 

[All uphill]

Agreed.
Whether it's my imagination or not, it does seem that motorway speeds have dropped notably. With the camper we've stripped unnecessary weight and dropped the motorway cruise control from 70 to 60mph and gained about 5mpg which is around 15%. 55mph may be required next.
The hypermilers show what can be achieved by taking fuel economy strategies to extremes.
Every little helps!

Is it just me that has trouble seeing fuel economy concerns and camper vans in the paragraph?

 

[Craig the cyclist]

The 'rules' taught were, apart from keeping top speed down a bit, get out of first gear as soon as possible, use the over-run cut off by staying in gear but foot off the accelerator (downhill or approaching junctions), use cruise control, and above all tyre pressures. The rule they said was car manufacturer's pressure fully laden plus 0.2 bar. On my own car this doesn't work as the gap is too great, so instead of 2.4 bar I run it with 2.5 front about 2.7 at the back, and a bit more when fully laden for holidays. You can save up to 12% fuel with extra pressure. If you overdo it you lose traction so some experimenting is called for.

When I bought my car - Citroen of course, like the best - both measurements had 6.1 litres per 100 km, and I have consistently managed to get the usage down to 4.8 litres. And I don't always drive that slowly!

An enormous amount of fuel is wasted by driving fast up hills. Common sense - slower up (90) and faster down (140)!

I went on a corporate driving course with 2 colleagues and an instructor. The instructor watched us all drive for a while, commenting and criticising. He then gave us a demonstration of what perfect driving should be like with all his knowledge. It was going well until he drove into the back of a car queuing for a roundabout on the Devon link road near South Molton at about 35mph. We had to get recovered and the day was cut short.

 

[Fab Foodie]

Is it just me that has trouble seeing fuel economy concerns and camper vans in the paragraph?

Nope. Neither do I claim to be Greta Thunberg!

This is our one indulgence. We run cheap and frugal cars and do relatively low personal mileages, neither fly (or have flown for a very long time) for personal pleasure. Our new house is thermally efficient and solar panelled.
Our camper is our happy-place, as frugal as a van gets pretty-much, and equivalent or better than many wankpanzers that people use for everyday life, school runs, willy-waving etc. It's our holiday-home, our social life, our weekends away - many of which are fairly local. It allows us easy access to friends and family. It's no more indulgent than owning a large car, or owning and towing a caravan in economic respects.
And yes, it may become prohibitively expensive. But we try to drive/use-it it wisely until we can no longer afford to do so.

 

[Milzy]

Hi all, I was pondering about the US petro dollars earlier. The world is dependent on them no matter what harmful pollution happens.
If we all scrap our I/C cars & soon we’ve all gone electric what happens then? No amount of wind farms, solar panels & unicorn farts will stop global collapse.
The hissy fit against Russia isn’t helping matters either.

 

[Rusty Nails]

The hissy fit against Russia isn’t helping matters either.

Russia's really hissy fit against Ukraine started it.

 

[mudsticks]

The hissy fit against Russia isn’t helping matters either.

I know right, just cos Russian troops marched into Ukraine, destroyed their cities, murdered, and brutalised their citizens, and are trying to grab land that doesn't belong to them, other countries got all narked, and started imposing sanctions.

I mean, chill out guys it's just a little skirmish, nothing to get all uppity about..

 

[mudsticks]

Hi all, I was pondering about the US petro dollars earlier. The world is dependent on them no matter what harmful pollution happens.
If we all scrap our I/C cars & soon we’ve all gone electric what happens then? No amount of wind farms, solar panels & unicorn farts will stop global collapse.
The hissy fit against Russia isn’t helping matters either.

What gives you the impression that we are all 'dependent' on US petro dollars??

What we're really dependent on is a livable planet, which among many other things includes clean air and water, biodiverse ecosystems, and also includes reasonably stable weather systems .

So farmers like me can reliably grow crops to feed people, like you, and not have them destroyed by freak or unpredictable weather..

Without that we are all stuffed.
Dollars mean nothing in all that..

 

[Milzy]

What gives you the impression that we are all 'dependent' on US petro dollars??

What we're really dependent on is a livable planet, which among many other things includes clean air and water, biodiverse ecosystems, and also includes reasonably stable weather systems .

So farmers like me can reliably grow crops to feed people, like you, and not have them destroyed by freak or unpredictable weather..

Without that we are all stuffed.
Dollars mean nothing in all that..

My farther in law is a farmer & he wants what you describe but the U.S petro dollar is a big part of this planet. The greedy rich should be happy to have food on the table but are selfish individuals who want their millions of profits every year.

 

[MrGrumpy]

Petrol will be priced something like right when burning it is no longer deemed a reasonable way of moving empty seats around the country; when the sight of a car with driver only in it is startling.
>/= 98% of vehicles arriving at my employer's HQ (car park capacity 700) are single occupant. When </= 2% are single occupant we'll be getting there.

Maybe ask why people drive in the first place ? They can keep putting the price up , it might reduce some usage however there are still those that rely on it to get for. A to B .

If only public transport was actually useful for those of us who live out with the large towns and cities. My eldest has to work three jobs at the moment to keep his income constant ?! Can’t get to those jobs by bus and on time !

 

[qigong chimp]

Maybe ask why people drive in the first place ? They can keep putting the price up , it might reduce some usage however there are still those that rely on it to get for. A to B .

If only public transport was actually useful for those of us who live out with the large towns and cities. My eldest has to work three jobs at the moment to keep his income constant ?! Can’t get to those jobs by bus and on time !

Just... stop it.

 

[MrGrumpy]

Just... stop it.

Why ? Can you not answer ?