economical driving

Thanks to the following I reduced my fuel consumption from 5.6 to 5.4L/100KM which means I have extra 50km to drive on full tank!!! 


1. Speeding. The faster you go the higher fuel consumption.
Once I was curious how fast I can get home from Enniskillen (about 250km) and guess what? I was there 7 minutes quicker if I obey the speed limits. Speeding is not worth it!

2. Accelerating. Be gentle - save money.

Again, from my own experience I know that gentle accelerating reduce fuel consumption. Seriously! With gentle acceleration turbo (in turbo diesel engines) won't turn on, similar in petrol engines.

          So when you enter the main road, accelerate gently, allow following trafic to overtake you by using hard shoulder (if it's safe to do so) reach and maintain your speed. Your car will slightly slow down when going uphill - that's fine - don't force it to speed up.

3. Braking with engine. Smart driving.

When exiting motorway or approaching the roundabout, reduce your speed by reducing gears. Save your brakes and fuel. Same as following trafic. Maintain the proper distance from car in fron of you and take your foot of acceleration when you see him braking.

4. Gear changing.

I change my gears at 2500 rpm. It's not true that car consumes more fuel at some speed. The higher rpm the higher fuel consumption. Listen to your car, when your engine gets noisy and find the best moment to change the gear.

Useful tip: if your car is not fitted with fuel efficiency sensor or you don't trust the sensor, you can simply check it yourself. Fill up your car full and reset daily mileage. When filling up next time write down how many litres it takes to fill up the tank. Record the number of miles/kilometers you drove.


You can use this calculator: (it's also available on your right hand side bar)

Or do it manualy:


Converting units. You may need to convert some units. To do that simply use Google. Type in search bar: 'X liters to gallons' (to convert X liters to imperial gallons), or 'Y miles to km' (to convert Y miles to km) - works both way. You can also divide, multiply, add, subtract etc in google search bar.


Where X is gallons and Y miles X/Y = MPG  
Where Z is liters and W is kilometers (Z*100)/W = L/100km 


E.g. on my last trip i drove 300miles (482km), by refilling I know I used 26L (6.8 gallons).


Fuel efficiency:
300/6.8 = 44MPG 
(26*100)/482 = 5.39L/100km