I am on a extended vacation in the Noth East for the last few months.
I am new to Insight driving for max MPG. I am on a constant learning curve. I did not take me long to figure out that to achive great milage per gallon, it requires lots of monitoring the inst. bar graph on the bottom of the display, and try and keep it as high as possible at all times. I am finding out that this is not as easy as it may seem. Since the weeather in the North East has been hotter than the last 50 years, it is very hard to drive with no Air Cond. running. I find that the little 1 liter engine has to give up a lot of its H. P. to run the A.C. compresser. This was cutting my gas milage to 57 MPG on interstate long trips. I tried running with Ecno mode fan only, with fan on max with windows closed. I was under the impression that with both windows wide open, the wind drag coming into the cabin of the car would ruin the drag coef. and there fore kill the gas milage. I tred the spray bottle of ice water and spritzing my fore head as some due on this site to keep cool. That, does not go over too well with the wife and her little Poodle dog. So on my last trip on the interstate from Syracuse, NY to Wilkes Barre, Pa. I opened both windows wide open.
Made the 140 mile trip with avg milage of 73 MPG. This was with my 2000 Insight,5 speed, overloaded. My wife,dog and myself our over the 360 lb limit. Not to mention all of our suitecases. I set the tire pressure to 50 PSI on all tires. At times on hills I was all the way down to 38 MPH. Ran my battery pack down to nothing several times on long hills, but it alaways managed to charge back up to full state. My point is that: It seems to me that gas milage is better by far, riding with open windows, than closed windows with AC on. I would like to get comments pro or con from this forum. I seem to get a lot of angry drivers, who have a problem with me going too slow for them. Some I would consider almost road rage. Blowing there horns, blinking lights, yelling, and in one case the single digit hand signal. This really upsets my wife. But all I do is give them a stupid smile as I wave at them. I think this upsets the Road Raged drivers even more. My experience so far tells me this: The Insight does not like A.C. ,up and down steep hills and high speed driving to get high MPG.
Seems like some drivers of big SUV's have a problem with small cars and saving gas. All the ones who blew the horn had no reson to, since I was way over to the right and they had pleanty of room to pass. They seem to just like to make noise against people saving gas.
I will keep you all posted, as I keep on truckin.
Thanks for a great Forum, that I totallyy enjoy reading.
Rick & :lol: Phyllis
I am new to Insight driving for max MPG. I am on a constant learning curve. I did not take me long to figure out that to achive great milage per gallon, it requires lots of monitoring the inst. bar graph on the bottom of the display, and try and keep it as high as possible at all times. I am finding out that this is not as easy as it may seem. Since the weeather in the North East has been hotter than the last 50 years, it is very hard to drive with no Air Cond. running. I find that the little 1 liter engine has to give up a lot of its H. P. to run the A.C. compresser. This was cutting my gas milage to 57 MPG on interstate long trips. I tried running with Ecno mode fan only, with fan on max with windows closed. I was under the impression that with both windows wide open, the wind drag coming into the cabin of the car would ruin the drag coef. and there fore kill the gas milage. I tred the spray bottle of ice water and spritzing my fore head as some due on this site to keep cool. That, does not go over too well with the wife and her little Poodle dog. So on my last trip on the interstate from Syracuse, NY to Wilkes Barre, Pa. I opened both windows wide open.
Made the 140 mile trip with avg milage of 73 MPG. This was with my 2000 Insight,5 speed, overloaded. My wife,dog and myself our over the 360 lb limit. Not to mention all of our suitecases. I set the tire pressure to 50 PSI on all tires. At times on hills I was all the way down to 38 MPH. Ran my battery pack down to nothing several times on long hills, but it alaways managed to charge back up to full state. My point is that: It seems to me that gas milage is better by far, riding with open windows, than closed windows with AC on. I would like to get comments pro or con from this forum. I seem to get a lot of angry drivers, who have a problem with me going too slow for them. Some I would consider almost road rage. Blowing there horns, blinking lights, yelling, and in one case the single digit hand signal. This really upsets my wife. But all I do is give them a stupid smile as I wave at them. I think this upsets the Road Raged drivers even more. My experience so far tells me this: The Insight does not like A.C. ,up and down steep hills and high speed driving to get high MPG.
Seems like some drivers of big SUV's have a problem with small cars and saving gas. All the ones who blew the horn had no reson to, since I was way over to the right and they had pleanty of room to pass. They seem to just like to make noise against people saving gas.
I will keep you all posted, as I keep on truckin.
Thanks for a great Forum, that I totallyy enjoy reading.
Rick & :lol: Phyllis