The rubber will hit the road on August 9th, quite literally, as my wife and I venture out to northern BC on a hypermiling mission. This time however, we won’t be taking the 100 mpg diesel smart car. We will be taking a 1997 Ford Escort sedan, powered by a 2.0 litre gasoline engine, with a 4 speed automatic transmission. We will have a Scangauge Fuel Economy Computer along for the ride, to help motivate a low appetite for fuel.

According to NRCAN’s Fuel Consumption Ratings website, the Ford Escort is capable of 6.3 L/100km on the highway. I’m going to set a conservative goal ahead of time - and try to beat that by at least 10% for the entire trip, which would mean getting 5.7 L/100 km, or 50 mpg imperial. For my US friends, the car is (now) rated for 31 mpg on the highway, although it used to be 34 mpg. I’m looking for at least 41 mpg US, which would be higher than any of the cars reporting at fueleconomy.gov.

This should probably be pretty easy right? I’ll be travelling with my wife Cynthia and a full complement of luggage, but thankfully, no roof racks. The car has A/C, which will be used sparingly.

The plan is to go from Abbotsford to Smithers in one day, then to Prince Rupert, and then return. We should see a minimum of 3000 kms of road, and roughly 170 litres of gasoline. I’m not going to modify the car in any way, except I’ll run with a bit higher tire pressure and if I’m really into it, I’ll put a strip of ‘vortex generators’ on the roof to see if I can reduce the aerodynamic drag. (I’m in the process of testing these kinds of items, and hope to make a case for using aftermarket aerodynamic devices at Coastal Pacific Xpress on the highway trucks. We spend $1 million a week on fuel.)

We will be hypermiling on this trip, which means driving the speed limit, anticipating traffic flow, coasting when practical (engine ON, foot OFF the accelerator, either in or our of N depending on situation), and keeping the foot off the brake pedal… I will be reviewing some specific automatic transmission strategies from ecomodder and cleanmpg, to see what others have learned and have to share. Between all of that, and by using the Scangauge, I’m pretty sure Cynthia and I can better the NRCAN fuel consumption rating by 10%. The car is running well, has had a recent oil change, and has 175,000 kms on it.

We’ll post some details while on the road.

Stay tuned…