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We left Phoenix on 8/5/6 at 5:00 AM and returned 16 days later. Our main goal was to attend the national Mini and Micro car show in Chrystal Lake IL. We also wanted to visit our daughter and the Dells in WI and several other stops along the way. Our daughter lives about 10 miles from Wayne, but we wern't able to meet him. We took our 2004 VW Golf TDI instead of our 2000 Insight because we had a lot of stuff to take to our daughters and bring a bunch of stuff back. Even though it would be fun to take the Insight as it qualifys as a mini car, we needed more room then the Insight has. I collect mini and micro cars, garden tractors, and aviation stuff and my wife collects ducks. We had left some tractor wheel weights and other parts at our daughters from the last trip and needed to take them home. We ended up buying a rare one wheel garden tractor, a box of machine tools and a bunch of other small things that added up to about 300+ lbs. We take mostly back roads as that is were you find most of the treasures and the speed limits are slower so it is easier to hypermile. We traveled through AZ, NM, TX, OK, AR, MO, IL, WI, MN, ND, MT, WY, and CO. We modifyed our return trip a bit so we could stop in CO and inspect a Taylor Flying Car a friend owns. She is a car collector and knows nothing about airplanes. It was good to help her out and fun to get the opportunity for a down and dirty hands on chance to inspect such a rare machine. 2 other notes; We hit some debri in OK and put a hole in the oil sump and we bought our first tank of biodiesel. All in all we had a great trip. Here are the stats;

miles driven 5481
fuel consumed 98.4
$ spent on fuel 318.90
average cost / gal $3.24
cost/ mile $0.058
average MPG 55.7
average distance / tank 685.1
average gals/ fillup 12.3
average dist / day 342.6
fillups 8
best MPG 60.08
worst MPG 51.28
longest tank 809.3
shortest tank 587.8

We set 3 personal best records for this car on this trip. 2 for MPG one for tank distance
We crossed 2 mile stones 60 MPG and 800 mile tank
I drove about 4000 miles and my wife about 1500
our average speed was about 60, some 80, and a couple hundred miles at 40 in cunstruction zones......Louis

Hi Louis:

___55 + mpg’s while on vacation with a TDI running the A/C probably 95% of the time and flying (flying is a relative term for some of us and you were indeed flying ;)) is one hell of a hypermiling vacation if you ask me! Nice job in the Diesel and I hope more can report similar FE after those kinds of miles …

___If we would have got together earlier in the week before my little incident, that would have been great as it would have been another opportunity to meet a friend in person who I have enjoyed writing to/posting back and forth with over the years both here and reading your occasional posts over at IC. With relatives down in Phoenix, the next time I am down there, I will be sure to look you up … Hopefully in mid-winter when it is 70 + in the day and sunny vs. that 110 - 120 degree stuff you guys call a wonderful "Dry Heat" ;) Although I do not get down there but every few years, let us hope we can get together at the Insight Marathon in two months as that will be a definite in my book!

PS: Any pics of the trip or what you possibly came across on your way up? Maybe even the micro-car meet in Crystal Lake itself?

___Good Luck

___Wayne

very impressive for a diesel! Gets me exicted to see the battle of hybrid vs diesel in the upcoming years to show! Gonna be great hypermiling ye hear ;)!

For a vacation right now anything above 50 is like wow, I want to extend it some more! Congrats!

Wayne
We used the A/C only about 10% of the time. We have become used to the "DRY HEAT" in AZ and find that moist air mixed with wind is comfortable to us, (well maybe just me). Most of the time the A/C was turned on was because when the phone would ring I have to roll up the windows so I can hear. I quiess that is what I get for so many years and thousands of hours of flying without hearing protection.
I'll try to get some pix of the show after we get them developed. You can look them up at www.microcar-minicar@yahoogroups.com . I'll try to get some pix of the Flying Car. It is very interesting. It was in the "CAR" configuration and the owners didn't want to put it into the "AIRPLANE" configuration. The brochure says you can convert it in 3 minutes but they converted it once, and it took 3 days.

Philmcneal
50+ mpg is great. We took in on vacation last year and got 40+. The slower back roads, little A/C, and the scan guage helped. We never did get the SC calabrated correctly but I find the instantanious is what really helps, it really isn't important how accurate it is, but it is important to know if you are sucking or sipping the fuel.
We have taken the Insight on several trips and have averaged 80+ on them but we needed the room on this trip.

On the last tank before we got home we filled with 80/20 BIODIESEL. That was a first for us. It cost 2 cents more then petrolium diesel and the seller claimed it would get better mileage. I'm not sure about that as the bio is a lighter fuel then the petro and therefore less BTUs. We filled in Montrose CO and climbed many very high peaks and fought some winds returning to Phoenix but averaged 58+ on that shortest tank. 58 is the second highest tank we have ever recorded with this car, and in very challenging terrain, so maybe bio will give better MPG. Anyway when figuring MPG with 80/20 Bio, do we count 100% of the fuel or just the 20% Petro? :) I know one tank isn't much data, but I like what I saw and I will use it when ever I find it.....Louis