Date:         Sat, 14 Jan 95 17:31:09 CST
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Joel Walker <JWALKER@ua1vm.ua.edu>
Subject:      Re: Gas Mileage

On Sat, 14 Jan 95 15:04:22 CST Donald Baxter said:
>Since Joel has been posting old road test, which are actually quite
>interesting, I want to know why my Vanagon doesn't get 19 MPG in city
>driving!  And what can I do to make it get 19 MPG in city driving (that's
>more like my Highway mileage!).

cause them things ain't NEFER right! :)  my AVERAGE for 80,000 miles is
just 19.5 mpg.  i normally get, in city driving, in a mostly flat town,
close to 17 mpg; in cold winters, more like 15 or so. but on the highway,
if i hold it down to between 60 and 65, i can get 20, maybe 21 or so.

when i lived in atlanta, the pace of the traffic and the continual hills
really dropped my city mileage waaaaaaaaay down. all the red lights didn't
help much either.

about the only thing you can do to get better city driving is to be lighter
on the throttle, get into as high a gear as is reasonable (for the traffic,
weather, and terrain), and try to judge the red lights so you don't have to
stop so often. and make as few short trips as possible.

not bloody likely, eh? :)

my opinion would be that if you can get 19 mpg on the highway around atlanta,
that you are driving in the range of 65-70 mph, or maybe a bit higher. if so,
then you likely get about 14-15 in city driving. for leadfoots, that's likely
to be normal. :)  problem is, in atlanta, if you are a light-foot, you'll be
run over by the other folks behind you ... some of which can be quite large
and of severely mean spirits.

joel