how driving like a trucker can save you money!

As I wrote in my (bad and lazy) introduction post I am a truck driver, in Belgium. I only do nation transportations, but the things I learned in my course to become one has learned me quite a bit on how I could save fuel and by doing so also money. I will give you some tips and tricks what I’ve learned and even use myself when driving my car. I hope you can save as much as I do!

Start once, stop once

The best thing you can do is once you start driving, you better keep driving. The amount of energy needed to get a car moved when it is standing still is so much more than to accelerate the car when it is already moving.
If you want the math on this one I can show you if you want.

Right is better than left

This is basically a prolonged tip from the previous one: the changes are high when you turn right you will stop more frequently than when you turn left. The distance can be more when you turn right, but the amount of fuel you use is less. More and more courier services make sure that their chauffeur turn more right than left because if this fact.

Anticipate more

This is to help you to make sure that you can keep driving without standing completely still. See as far as you can. If you see a red traffic light, let the accelerator lose and let the care role further. Don’t put the gear in neutral, but try to keep it in the highest gear possible before changing gears.
If you see that one car is starting to brake and the others not, keep your foot of the gas. If all of them are starting to brake, then you can do it to.

A gear higher

When you drive from a scarp put the gear one higher if possible. If the scarp is steep enough the chances are high that you can keep the same speed without using any fuel whatsoever.

It’s not a race

This is probably the well-known trick: if you accelerate you use more fuel. Higher rPM, more consume fuel, losing more money and the big thing is that if you drive calmly you aren’t going to be more than 5 minutes later than the person who thinks he is in a race. This is especially true in a densely crowed area. With all the traffic jams and traffic lights you’re just going to accelerate to be standing still again.

Tire pressure

Make sure the pressure on your ties is perfect. By doing so you can let your car role further and make sure it is in gear. If you let your car role in gear, you use zero fuel at that moment. If you put the gear in neutral, then you are using fuel again. Even if you are driving your consumption of your fuel will be less with the right ties pressure, because there is less friction and so less consumption.

Parking backwards

A cold engine consumes more fuel than a warm one. It takes more or less 15 minutes before the engine is warm. So by parking backwards, you don’t consume as much fuel by maneuver the car to get out of your parking place. Because, as we have seen, it takes more fuel to get the car moving.
Another great tip, especially when it is cold as in the winter, is to make sure your rPM is low until the engine is warm. By doing so you don’t wear the engine as much.

Airconditioning

If you start the arico immediately, than you will use more fuel. The best thing you can do is to open your windows and when the temperature in the car is as it is outside, you can put the airco on.
Ideal you don’t put it on at all. Don’t start driving with open windows, because that is even worse than driving with arico on.

Same speed

If you have cruise control use it as much as possible. When you drive at exactly the same speed you fuel consumption will be very low. When you drive manually you always have a chance that you accelerate, even if it is one mile per hour, it consume more fuel that way. The cruise control makes sure, you don’t accelerate at all.

Those tips and tricks I talked above are the ones I use as much as possible. Not only in my professional life, but even in my private life. People always assume that being fast and first are the best way to get there faster. That’s not true at all, I can’t count how many cars I drove by, by just anticipate better: when I see that the traffic light is red, I let my vehicle roll and the moment it turns green I put my gas pedal in and so the cars that drove me by, I drove by now because they are standing still while I am not.