With increases fuel prices, its important we switch to more fuel efficient cars or simply change your driving habits to extract more mileage/fuel efficiency from your car.
Here are some tips which could help you get the best mileage from your car and reduce your fuel bills:
- Always maintain recommended tyre pressure (Check once in a month). Refer Tyre information label on driver side door/pillar on your vehicle or under specification section of owners manual. Under inflated tyres increase rolling resistance, which leads to higher petrol consumption.
- Drive at steady speeds between 50-60 kmph
- When accelerating, shift down to a lower gear and accelerate gradually instead of flooring the pedal in the same gear
- Keep air filter clean
- Avoid idling at red lights, it wastes fuel. Switch off engine if stop time is more than 60 seconds
- While braking, coast down to a lower speed in gear with your foot off the accelerator, and then shift the gear to neutral
- Shift to 5th gear as soon as possible. Typical speed for gear shifting with AC off is:
- 1st to 2nd 10 km/hr
- 2nd to 3rd 20-25 km/hr
- 3rd to 4th 30-35 km/hr
- Drive smoothly. Avoid sudden breaking and acceleration
- Remove your foot from clutch pedal after changing gears
- Your car’s fuel efficiency improves after run in period. It stabilizes after 3000 kms. (In a new car, higher friction leads to lower fuel efficiency)
- Best way to calculate car’s mileage is by following the full tank to full tank method
- Run the car till the tank is ¼ of its full capacity. Fill the tank full again in the same fuel filling station
