Third meeting proves to be great success as interest increases
Jud Engles and Auston Hensley - CleanMPG - July 7, 2008
Official group photo from the third meet.
Compare to the first one on April 12 below. I can only hope that we can bring more people to the light. 
- Ed.
The 3rd meet up of the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Hybrid and Hypermilers Group was on July 5th, 2008 in Ft. Thomas, Kentucky. We met at the Tower Park as before and a total of 13 people came and enjoyed the gathering. We had a Prius battery demonstration and teardown by Wayne Mitchell from Chicago and fuel economy discussions by Larry Trowbridge from Elkhart, IN. Meanwhile, Hadi Allameh was the master chef, grilling up burgers and dogs for us all. Auston gave some driving clinics with Jay and Kelly and we topped it all off with a Fuel Economy challenge.
The weather forecast was for 78 degrees and mostly cloudy with a chance of thunderstorms. We got 70 and overcast with some drizzle, which later cleared up to mostly sunny and 85 degrees or so, and very humid. We were all sweating it up, because after all, true hypermilers never, ever crank the A/C. Excellent driving conditions though for our fuel economy challenge. I may have a few choice words to describe driving Jay's dark red Prius with its red/black seats and upholstery in that heat though.
One of the big highlights though (I think) was how so many new members showed up for this month's meet. Some of us just showed up off the street and we've never even heard of each other before. I remember hearing Craig (who drives a 4x4 Toyota 4Runner) saying he simply googled how to get better gas mileage and happened across our thread on CleanMPG and then decided to show up. He's sold on a Prius and that's definitely his next vehicle.
Official group photo:
Attendees are left to right:
Craig Blake
Hadi Allameh
Larry Trowbridge
Auston Hensley
Aaron Carito
Kelly Cardona
Sharon Cardona
Jay Groh
Wayne Mitchell
Teresa Mitchell
Jud Engels
Not shown:
Sonya Engels
Brent Quebman
For comparison, our April 5 meeting. I wish Nathan and Lacy could have made it this month but perhaps next time?
Five Priuses in a row which I swear is the most I've ever seen in one place together.
An alternate view from earlier.
Facing the basketball courts (Left to right): Aaron's Prius, my Echo, Jay's Prius, Jud's Prius, Sonya's Jetta TDI
Facing the woods (Left to right): Wayne's Prius, Larry's Prius, Brent's Passat, Craig's 4Runner, Sharon's Civic
A view of the entire area including parking lot, basketball court, and pavilion where we all hung out.
First up we had a great introduction and discussion on hybrids, fuel economy and where the country is going.
Next Wayne Mitchell gave a tremendous presentation on the Prius Battery. He brought a battery with him and disassembled it and explained all the ins and outs of the operation and construction. The presentation was informative and very helpful understanding the Prius battery.
Lunch was next. Hadi has a new title - Master chef of the barbecue. Great job Hadi and thanks Sonya for making up all the fixings. After some much needed sustenance (burgers and dogs) there was some more discussion while Auston gave a clinic to Kelly while also showing the course to Jay in the Echo and Jud gave a Prius clinic to Aaron. Oh, and Jud told the story of threading the needle during Reenactment II again. I think every time he tells it the speed or the number of trucks involved increases. LOL
One of the coolest parts (no pun intended) of the gathering was Brent's infrared camera. He has a infrared video camera and took lots of clips of the battery and cars. One thing that surprised him, was after the clinic with Aaron in his Prius, he took a shot of the front tire. the disk was not even warm. Hopefully, Brent will post some of the pics.
The Fuel Economy Challenge
We used the Prius and ran four different vehicles over the same 5.2 mile course we've run previously. The nine mile course was discarded to save time. I still pushed for the longer one since the landmark for turning around at the midway point was an enormous lifted blue Dodge Ram 1500 4x4 with the V8 engine and giant knobbly off-road tires. For sale.
For this run we warmed up the Priuses to S4 and a SoC of roughly 56%. This is different from the previous time when we ran it all the way until we got seven green bars (about 70% SoC) producing some really high numbers. I still say everyone should have seen the look on Jud's face when it came time to do the fuel economy challenges. His face lit up in a way I hadn't seen before. LOL
Here are the results:
| Name_________________________ | Miles Per Gallon (MPG) |
|
Wayne | 143 MPG |
|
Jud | 140 MPG |
|
Auston | 128 MPG |
|
Hadi | 119 MPG |
|
Craig | 111 MPG |
|
Jay | 111 MPG |
|
Larry | 109 MPG |
|
Aaron | 86.9 MPG |
Gentleman start your engines, or Uh... boot up your computers.
Wayne's advantage: Magic glasses
Scanguage results:
This deserves a story of it's own: I'm going down Ft. Thomas Avenue which is a four lane road with a posted speed limit of 25 MPH. I'm milking a glide for all it's worth because there's a stop sign coming up and I'm down to about 18 MPH in a 25 zone. An old lady - the stereotypical 80+ year old granny who's sitting real low in the seat, peering between the wheel and the dash to see the road - driving a blue Buick LeSabre got right on my butt and within five seconds blasted the horn. I just waved her around and when Jay and I realized who it was (
"It's an old lady!") we just cracked up really badly right then and there which just as well ruined my glide since I wasn't concentrating.
She went around, sped up, and them promptly rode the next Prius's butt which can't have been more than a hundred yards ahead. Blasted the horn again, got waved on, sped up, went around again. And then Jud and Craig also got quite a laugh out of the event as she passed us all giving that cold stare.
Thanks again to everyone for coming. All in all the meet of the Northern Kentucky Hypermiler's club was a great success. Thanks again to Jud for doing about 90% of the logistics and planning for this meet, to Wayne for his excellent Prius battery teardown, to Hadi for being the master chef for two meets running, to Craig for willing to find out about more fuel-efficient vehicles and put one on his list, Aaron for improving his mileage from the mid 40's in his Prius to 86 in the fuel economy run and 58 MPG while returning home later that day, and to everyone else who showed up and made it a great meet. Also to CleanMPG for having been the catalyst for this whole deal…
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