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Ever since I got a girlfriend my FE has gone down because I have to balance FE with not driving her nuts. The good news is that she drives her FSP (Jeep commander) much more consciously and fuel efficiently. Not great but much better than before......what have you experienced?

Did you want a poll to go with this thread?

Uh, YEAH.

Warming the interior up for a baby is a killer, but at least one we don't do it much because the vehicle either doesn't sit long enough or it is in a garage. When it is -7F out and the car has been sitting for several hours though, it doesn't matter how much you wrap that baby -- she still has to breath! :(

My girlfriend seems to be on board with the hypermiling. I am more likely to turn on the air or heat when she's in the car, but she doesn't complain about the lack of speed or coasting up to stops, etc.

Definitely, My fiance feels it's a waste of time to drive with me. She says there is no logic to the feelings, however, so I have to try not to drive her nuts. In particular she says she drives 65 on this one particular highway, I pointed out that the limit was 55 and that's illegal, the minimum is 40, perfect for pulse and glide. She pointed out that I had mentioned going up to 65 and I told her that was on the other highway.

I'm going to file this away in my brain as a convenient excuse...
:-)

I'm also waiting to see who's foolish enough to collect data off their SG-II in order to prove statistically to their S.O. that they're causing reduced FE...
(will probably wind up being me who tries it)

Sure. If I weren't married, I'd drive less, and the miles would almost exclusively be highway. I'd also drive a manual transmission car with better EPA ratings (Insight, Echo, Yaris, Civic VX?). As it is, I'm driving an automatic transmission Civic - decent mileage, but definitely not the best. I also end up using air conditioning, I drive faster, and I'm struggling to find eco mods that meet my wife's aesthetic approval.

That said, she really is good about letting me drive most of the time and putting up with speeds 5-10 mph below the speed limit on highways in light to moderate traffic. She also puts up with NICE-On coasting, limited FASing, and reduced climate control usage.

I'm going to file this away in my brain as a convenient excuse...
:-)

I'm also waiting to see who's foolish enough to collect data off their SG-II in order to prove statistically to their S.O. that they're causing reduced FE...
(will probably wind up being me who tries it)

I already know my S/O kills my FE. I already have plans to collect that data, I am just waiting to get a SGII so I can know by how much. She hates is when I coast up to a stop sign or light. I explain that there is no point in racing to a light you know you have to stop at. She does realize that logically I have a point but there is still that feeling of having to go fast because it is faster. She does some NICE-on and DFCO, but she has times where she just doesn't want to deal with all that thought process while driving.

As long as I'm going along with the flow of traffic, my wife seems to be okay. It's not too bad on the highway since it's easy to somewhat blend into normal traffic with P&G and still get reasonable gas mileage. She's amused at how I FAS at lights and NICE-off on some streets.

yeah! can we do a poll? do it someome!

Girlfriend definitely doesn't give me any problems on it and likes my conservative driving, actually. The way I see it, if you ask to ride with me and you complain about my driving, get out and use your own transportation. Unless I've offered to take someone, only then do I sometimes have to "eat crow" and drive a little more "like them".

It did for about a week until I sold it as "ecodriving" and then she was on board :)

We hypermilers are such a small % of the population, perhaps it is unreasonable to expect our mates to share our view. Still frustrating.

I have the best Hypermiling wife in the world!:woot: She rarely ever complains(at least not seriously anyway:p) and even does her best in her car.:Banane59:

Hah... I got in trouble for doing the speed limit on the way back from PA to NC (70 PSL) this past weekend. She looked at me and said, "Why are you going so slow?" I shot back, "Sorry, I'm ONLY driving the limit. I can pull over so you can drive if you'd like". Which is what we did ;). I wasn't too worried as we were only about 50 miles out at that point, and she didn't kill the overall tank too badly. Pregnancy hormones are so not cool.

I still do high speed p&g with her in the car....she even finds it amusing when I fas as long as it feels like were moving along.....but in her fsp I just dfco. Ill convert her more and more until she's getting 40mpg outa that jeep commander!!

Of course it has.

Haven't had much time off lately -- only day off I've had in the last few weeks (including weekends) was Xmas Day itself. I found myself driving home a little more aggressively than normal, and sometimes taking a shorter route up a mountain that really kills the fuel economy so I could get home faster. I'm down about 1.5 MPG than I usually am in this current tank of gas.

As for S/O, I never turn the car off at red lights when my wife is with me--mainly b/c I'm a lot more indulgent with the HVAC when she's in the car.

If a husband falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, is he still wrong? Yes! Therefore hypermiling must be wrong, since I think its right.

Although, if I am vigilant, she usually comes around. I'm coming up on a year of hypermiling on Jan 5th and some things have stuck. She has stopped hating me for coasting to red lights and she does only use the AC or Heat when necessary, although no DWG for her yet :rolleyes: Overall, I give up a few percent and I get batter at making the techniques seems more normal to her all the time.

OK, so I'm waiting for some of the women on here to comment on how their guys mess up their HM efforts??

In my case, I don't comment about her driving and she doesn't comment about mine. She doesn't HM but is a very careful driver. Occasionally she jokes mildly about how long it takes me to get anywhere, but it isn't serious.

Mostly with her and with other people I try to HM so smoothly that they don't even notice. Fiddling with the key to do a FAS is a giveaway, but other than that it's surprising what you can slip by people.

Our family "carpools?" Different drivers each day based on trip. I tried to log fills but noone followed suit. I can't measure tanks, just my own trips via SGII. My wife does DWB even when I'm not looking, that's as far as it goes. I'm not driving my own truck anymore, so can't track that either.
My family does prefer that I drive- the trip is very smooth.

Keith

I just had a "heated" discussion with my wife and her friend about my hypermiling. I drove us, with 2 small kids, tonight in our new 2009 (semi-fsp) GMC Acadia. In reality, I was just doing some minimal NICE-ON and (maybe) Dfco (I don't have an SGII, so I don't know for sure) coasting up to red lights. My wife and her friend both claim to logically understand why coasting up to a light makes sense and doesn't slow us or other traffic down at all when you consider that we're all going to stop anyway, but it just "feels wrong" to them. They say things like how it's inconsiderate to other drivers, frustrating them... that it holds up traffic, etc. I always come back with "yeah, but we all end up stopped at the light anyway". My wife's friend asked me if I noticed when someone zipped around and jumped in front of us as I was coasting up to a red light, into the left turn lane. I said "yes, and we both ended up waiting to turn for around 20-seconds, right?" She agreed, but just kept saying "yeah... but he was annoyed with how slow we were going".

I actually *do* look out for everyone else, when it makes a difference. For example, I always make sure not to block a turn lane that someone might be able to use before I coast up to a light, for example. So I change lanes (reverse pass) or even speed up a bit sometimes, as much as the latter kills me and dings my FE. But if we're all going to stop anyway, I can't help but do it right.

My wife usually accepts my slower driving without complaint. However, she did comment yesterday about my coasting up to a stoplight. I reminded her there was no point in rushing up to the light, since we'd have to stop anyway. As it was, I made the right choice. The stoplight turned green in time for me not to lose my rolling momentum.

Yesterday afternoon, as I'm coasting to an upcoming red light:
Her: "Ah, this isn't safe, someone's going to cut you off and then we'll hit them..."
Me: "Ok, and if I can't stop without hitting them while I'm going 11 MPH and slowing, I really shouldn't be driving at all."

Seriously, she was mad that I was coasting to a redlight in traffic.
Like I'm supposed to punch the gas, then brake hard when I get to the light.

Seriously, she was mad that I was coasting to a redlight in traffic.
Like I'm supposed to punch the gas, then brake hard when I get to the light.There was actually a hypermiling article in Britain that in addition to casting hypermlers as red-light runners and semi-drafters, went so far as questioned coasting in gear to a stop. :confused:

I just got back from visiting the GF and droveto her commander (Jeep FSP). I was able to get around 16-18mpg in cold weather with only dfco and coasting to stops, dwb, etc. Wow that thing is heavy and boxy and is an aerodynamic nightmare box! Oh well, she actually bragged about my mileage to her parents and said she drives very differently when Im not around. She actually brags about getting 18mpg outa that thing! Lots of fuel beingsaved now compared to her STOMP on gas STOMP on brake past!!Think I'll keep her!

Seriously, she was mad that I was coasting to a redlight in traffic.
Like I'm supposed to punch the gas, then brake hard when I get to the light.

That seems to be a recurring thing with S/Os. Mine felt the same way about coasting to a light. All you can do is explain (but don't push the point) that if you have to stop anyways you might as well coast. It is one of those things that is drilled into us as we learn to drive and it seems illogical to do otherwise. Just give her time and she will come around to at least accept your ways.

Delta, I would be interested to see that article if you have a link to it or something.

Delta, I would be interested to see that article if you have a link to it or something.

Anyone heard of "Coast and Burn?" :D

Another hypermiling article on Karl Dyson (http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/features/Hypermiling-taking-fuel-economy-to.4370638.jp)

BTW, Karl explictly did not endorse drafting and the like, which of course got lost in these articles.

It's gone both ways for me before. At one time I was doing a lot more highway driving to see her, which raised my MPG (although my total fuel consumption was, of course, much greater as well). And after the breakup...well...yeah. It went down. Not as much as it used to though, the car doesn't really work for me anymore to get my aggressions out.

I don't do much hypermiling with my wife in the car. Some, yes, but not everything. For example, I won't FAS at a light, since that would freak her out. I MIGHT P&G a little.

I'll do it with kids, though, as they aren't generally paying attention.

-Mike

Well, mine dumped me on Monday. Too bad, she actually got good FE driving me home in my car on NYE. But in the end she would have been too costly anyway...

My wife is the primary driver of our (one-and-only) Civic Hybrid. I usually drive when we're both in the car, and on evenings/weekends, but she's the main driver: I'm the pit crew ;)

First, my two room mates are husband and wife.

One room mate (a hardcore "environmentalist"):
"You drive too slow"
"You waste too much time"

Yeah... And I'm getting the 30 mpg out of my Ranger (28 hwy epa), just like you are in your Cavelier (32 hwy epa).
I cringe every time I am in the car with her driving. Routine acceleration for her hits 5K rpm.

Other room mate:
"that's cool" when I mention the mileage I am getting out of the Ranger. He's not a hypermiler, but has nothing at all against it (and airs up all of our tires to max sidewall).

He matches my 30 mpg in his HHR (30 hwy epa), so he's not doing bad at all. When he is driving the Cavalier he "only" hits between 3K and 3.5K rpm. He is also the main driver of my Dodge Ram (it's been adopted as the company truck) and usually hits 2.5K rpm when accelerating in that (I try to keep it below 2K).

As for my girlfriend, we haven't been in the same vehicle since I started. She lives 30 miles away and works 100 miles farther away. She also works weekends while I work weekdays so we don't see each other as often as we would like.

My HUSBAND doesn't drive my car. He's only driven it once when it was new. He complains sometimes about how slow I'm driving when I'm trying to get a good long glide in. He pretty much understands hypermiling.

Generally he's pretty good himself--he gets about 36-40 mpg in his Focus SW.

I do cheat a little on my mpg--if we have a bunch of short trips, we take his car! :D

I don't know why people don't understand how much gas they're wasting racing to the red lights. I see guys in their big trucks doing it too, not just women.

It always seems like guys in big trucks are coming up behind me, seems like they're trying to intimidate me--but I guess they don't know about the auto-dimming mirror!!

Yeah, it's hard to P&G while holding hands with the gf.

She's sorta coming around. The gas spike earlier this year really made her stop and think about her driving habits. They've improved a bit. She's actually coasting up to some lights. However, she is a bit intimidated driving her Escort in the area she lives in, because it's the smallest thing on the roads by her.

Well, mine dumped me on Monday. Too bad, she actually got good FE driving me home in my car on NYE. But in the end she would have been too costly anyway...

They all are! I had just bought my gf a $90 purse for her birthday (and I make $7,84/hour) and she accused me of being cheap because the tattoo which was her second-place birthday wish was more.

aye aye aye! girls don't like boys. Girls like fast cars and money ;)

Ricardo, they aren't all that shallow. That does seem to be a stage most go through, though... later they look for dependability and personal worth instead. :)

wouldnt having another person in the car mean you are carpooling and morally increase your mpg twofold?
think about that

oh and for those of you gathering data, be careful not to mention added mass in the car, that would be very bad as women twist words around

You are correct on both counts. :)

By the way, we call that "Per Person MPG" -- it is defined as the fuel economy multiplied by the number of occupants.

I always multiplied by the number of people to get my people mileage.

Am I wrong?

i think not, i think it was a typo, otherwise cleanmpg would be against carpooling, that would be bad

Pardon -- it should be the fuel used divided by the number of occupants. So yes, Kacey is correct -- multiply the fuel economy by the number of occupants.

Yes, my HUSBAND could easily mess up my MPG. He says life is too short. He doesn't drive far and wants to have "fun" doing it. I'm having lots of fun learning these new hypermiling techniques. I still have a long way to go, though.

Hi, Ruby! Good to see you here; it sure was nice to meet you in person!

Yes, my HUSBAND could easily mess up my MPG...
That's what I was thinking in my situation as well.
(But my husband has only driven my car twice, so it's hard to measure the effect. I can only guess by watching the way he drives his vehicle that he would totally mess up my MPG.)

The title of this thread needs to be tweaked; instead of "girlfriend\wife\life situations" I think it would be more fair to say something like "significant other/spouse/life situations".

In order to justify the 18" (diameter mirror) telescope in my avatar, and my other 8 telescopes, I bought my wife her car. She then gave her old car to her daughter. After I bought her her car, I asked if it would be okay if I bought a telescope for a new hobby. That made the cost of my telescopes about double, but it was worth it.