How to Encourage Society to Drive at Safer Speeds and Save Gas
 

Just as Tire Pressure Monitor Systems are required by law to make a vehicle more fuel efficient, it should ALSO be required to have a VERY obvious MPG display.

Not will this save lives (due to fewer freeway speeding accidents), make a country a little less dependent on foreign oil, and better for the environment, but a blatant dashboard MPG display would be a constant reminder about the wastefulness of fast driving.

BTW, my most recent tank refill, numbers were 51.5 mpg today and 51.3 mpg last week done with my 27y/o Honda Civic hatchback.

All new cars have some form of measuring fuel consumption and displaying it. I can configure mine to display in a few places. I usually have a digital speedo right in front of me, and the MPG screen to my left on the larger touchscreen. Truth is, some people don't even know what a MPG is, or other methods of measurement for that matter. A cost per mile display would be better, where the user can input the cost per litre or gallon, and then the car will display your instant cost per mile, and then at the end of every trip, your cost per trip too.

Some cars use a scoreboard, giving points for acceleration, coasting and braking. This is displayed at the end of every trip. This could be a fun idea, making each journey like a game trying to beat your previous score.

If someone doesn't care about fuel economy, then it's easy to ignore the MPG display. That's what I did in my old car.

If someone does care about fuel economy, then they've likely already adopted driving habits to increase fuel economy. An MPG meter is for those who care.

FYI, I used my instantaneous fuel economy meter[1] to determine my ideal cruise speed for hypermiling. It also shows me when my diesel engine is in a DPF (Diesel Particulate Filter) "renewal" cycle because fuel consumption jumps notably. If I'm on the highway when this happens, I'll increase my cruise speed to roughly where the consumption is about the same (higher speed) so I can cover more distance with the same, higher fuel burn brought on by the DPF cycle.

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[1] Inaccurate, but useful for relative readings.

87 300 ZX I bought at a salvage auction had a fuel economy display. Had all the parts to fix it in stock. I remember average speed and mpg displays. Digital dash. Friend who bought it was still driving it 10 years later. Recycled almost 200 cars over a 30 year period.

30 years ago

R.I.D.E., with so much salvage auction experience, what advice can you give us?

Stay away from them. Seen people get burned badly when they get involved without a huge amount of experience. Every single example is a unique set of circumstances.
My buddy just bought a totaled Neon for $150, marked flood damaged. He stuck his finger in the wet floor carpet and tasted it, no salt taste, so it was fresh water.
He did nothing except dry out the car and started it up, and it ran perfectly. Ten years old with 50k miles, garage kept, with no paint deterioration.

Nobody wants 10 year old Neon. If it was a Honda, it would have never sold for that and by the time he got through all the auction fees, and state inspection charges, his cost was $650. He has a dealership license in Virginia. I don't think private parties can even get into the auction and he has been doing this for 30 years, worked for his father when he was 12 years old.

If you decide to try anyway, look for a driveable total, but you can not start the cars, so you have to just take a chance, and your playing with the big boys, and they seldom let anything good get by them. A lot of the totals are shipped overseas, where they could care less about branded titles or even titles, which for a US citizen is a critical component.

I've bought cars that never had a full tank of gas through them, but the chances of getting burned are much higher. One of the best examples I remember was a 1972 BMW 2002, that I won with a $300 bid. IT had $1100 in receipts for various things in the previous month, was hit in the rear end, and driveable.

I left the FCD up in my wife's van, she won't bother changing it. The result? She tried for a week or so, and now just carries on as before. For her, the time saved, real or imagined, is more valuable than the fuel saved.

What's an 'FCD'?

fuel consumption display

Correctamundo!

How accurate are FCDs? Someone here mentioned they weren't accurate, I assume when the math was done after a fill up.

It varies, the one in my Honda insight was very accurate, within 1 MPG. The one in my GTi is less so, on average it reads 3.5 MPG higher than actual, but it's still a very useful tool. Of course the pump stations must have a degree of innacuracy too, it's hard to tell unless you take a measuring cylinder there and do some tests.

I do drive a little where the speed limit is 75 on the freeway. I do 65.
Although I try not to be a problem to other drivers. I am slower, in general.
I thought about putting a sticker on my car that says:
PLEASE FORGIVE MY SLOWNESS
I'M GETTING 40 MILES PER GALLON

People are often surprised and impressed that a Corolla is getting that kind of mileage. Again, yesterday I got 41.1 . Getting 41.(something) consistently during summer. And 65 on the freeway isn't all that slow.

How can we expect people to think, when as of 2014, 70M Americans were on Legal Mind Altering Drugs.

They're really all over the map. I've never had enough time with the wife's van to verify its accuracy, and that's the only car we've had with such a readout.

I have been running an UltraGauge for years now, and before that a ScanGauge, so I've never really missed having such a display built in.

You know what proved to encourage people to save gas? High gas prices! When they were at their peak, so were sales of EV, Hybrids, and PHEVs. Ditto with more fuel-efficient vehicles. At least this is true in America and Canada. In the 1970s, the Energy Crisis (severely constrained fuel supply) was instrumental in getting people to save gas. During that era, folks readily accepted speed limit reductions to 55 MPH, and America shifted from buying the traditionally huge gas-guzzling American cars to smaller, more fuel-efficient foreign brands.

Evidently, people can be persuaded to make certain decisions based on financial pressures. Go figure.

Son in law drove us down on the beach just north of Corolla (outer banks of North Carolina) yesterday, in his Suburban with 7 people and two dogs on board, at 4 MPG.

I probably got 55 driving there from Williamsburg and back, even with some AC usage and going as fast as the rest of traffic. Included was a 10 mile crawl, where at times we were being outrun by a jogger, but altogether a good day at the beach. Even got to play some chess with the grandson.

According to the Solomon curve (aka the crash risk curve), slower isn't necessarily safer in terms of crash risk in real world driving. In fact, crash data suggests it is more dangerous.

If you're looking at pure physics like force of impact, reaction and braking times, then yes slower is safer in a vacuum, as in no other cars around you.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_curve
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...omon_Curve.png

Keep in mind that the 'average speed' can often be ABOVE the posted speed limit, oftentimes MUCH above the posted speed limit on Interstates, because our Interstate limits are usually set for the sake of politics and revenue, not sound traffic engineering.

I had an idea before and I'm pretty sure it probably exists. Have your live MPG display on a LED screen on your rear window and more people would be aware of MPG. Would be tacky though :lol:

Yep, driving faster isn't necessarily less safe. The fatality rates on Autobahns are almost half that on US highways, and half of them have no speed limits, you'll regularly see people in performance cars doing 150-200 MPH on them. Most roads only allow overtaking on one side, unlike the US where you can overtake in any lane, which means twice as many blind spots, twice as many safety checks before manoeuvring, and twice as many chances to collide with another vehicle really. Alot of the accidents here are caused by slow drivers forcing those of whom want to make good time or enjoy driving to lose patients and overtake.

A lot of that will also point towards driver training. Moving to Texas, riding motorcycles, and driving trucks have all given me eye-opening views to the faults of John Q. Driver here.

In a way it's good, as I'm much less likely to resort to road rage or aggressive driving. On the other hand, I regularly see right-of-way violations, lane discipline violations, and a general free-for-all.

I remember reading about a German driver on the autobahn that was camera ticketed for following to close. The fine, based on ability to pay, was $35,000 US. Also understand you are not likely to see an ancient poorly maintained, pile of junk going down the German roads anywhere and I have seen some unbelievable examples of cars that were such deathtraps, I refused to even pull them out on the 25mph road next to my shop.

If they incorporated the same stringent regulations here, the liberals would go berserk claiming prejudice against the poor.

2/3rds of my $75 per year motorcycle insurance premium, is for uninsured motorists. I guess they throw the idiot who runs over me and leaves the scene into that category. A long time ago a friends brother was run over, riding a Kawasaki 900. The cops followed the pieces of him and the bike to the lady's driveway. She told them she did not even know she had slaughtered a human being.

If we were to enforce such stricter regulations for cars, we'd have to invest in better public transit, or we will end up with poorer people unable to get to work and going on welfare of some type.

Speed limits would be a good place to start. One way to make people keep the speed limits is require the manufacturer to install a GPS speed limiter in every vehicle where it reads the speed limit and will not allow the vehicle to go over that limit.

They already have them on GPS devices as warnings so this would not be a hard thing to incorporate into a vehicle.

What is being introduced here in Scotland is Average Speed Cameras. There are a ton of them on the A9, between Perth and Inverness. The camera reads the number plate at the start then reads it again at the end. The time difference gives your speed, and if you are over the limit the registered keeper gets a ticket. The work on the new Forth Crossing has them, with cameras at every on and off ramp. Traffic sits at 40 mph, day or night.

Speed limits will always be ignored, but I have seen average speed cameras actually work. As soon as people see the signs, they assume they must adhere to it or face a fine, and now speeding fines have increased, you must pay a weeks wages in some cases.

In Scotland, the signs are backed up by working cameras. The cameras are very evident too. If a camera is not on line, they have to put up a sign saying "Camera Under Test". Police Scotland seem particularly keen to prosecute motorists, with mobile camera vans working every day. As a part time van driver, I see our local one as it moves round the area. There was one spot, north of Glenrothes, where new signs were installed. On the morning they were unmasked (50 mph down to 40 mph), the camera van was booking motorists. It had been 50 for 20 or 30 years!

The centre of Edinburgh is now a heavily enforced 20 mph zone. By January 2018 almost the entire city, with the exception of the main drags in (currently 40 mph), will be 20 mph, full or part time. When you have driven in the city for years it is very easy to get caught out. Despite the 6 foot diameter roundels!

That's brilliant!

That's ESPECIALLY brilliant!

The new Ford S-Max has "Intelligent Speed Limiter"

Does it work? Ford’s Intelligent Speed Limiter tested by CAR Magazine

This will read speed signs and adjust the cars speed accordingly.

Another step on the way to self driving cars.

Quite a few cars have these now. Reliability varies. On the Honda Jazz site they say it recognises 20, 30 40 and 50, but fails to recognise 55, sometimes used at construction works.
I switched off my TomTom Satnav speed warning as the maps, though updated regularly were pretty inaccurate. You'd be driving along in a 60 when it would warn you it should be 30, when in fact it was the village the other side of the trees that was 30.

My speed limit reminders work of GPS I think, fairly accurate but some strange anomalies here and there. I do have a speed limiter, but it's up to me whether to turn it on, and at what speed to set it, don't really use it to be honest. The Renault Megane I drove last year used cameras like a Tesla to read the signs.

Interesting. If it can be done, I'm sure MOST everyone turns off that feature.