Nine Ways to Save on Gas This Summer

Smart Money lists nine ways to save on gas this summer including the amounts you'll save if you follow the tips from now until Labor Day:

• Check your tires: $29
• Forgo premium fuel: $86
• Get a tune-up: $129
• Slow down: $95
• Combine errands: $107
• Let go of your aggression: $95
• Pack light: $17
• Swap vehicles: $25
• Look for gas incentives: $150

I'm personally trying to be less of a "pedal to the metal" sort of driver, keeping a close eye on the air pressure in my tires, and (of course) not using premium fuel. But there's a thought here that never registered with me. When we go somewhere (shopping, out to eat, church, etc.), we take my Subaru Forester since I'm the one who drives and it has a bit more room. But maybe we should take my wife's Toyota Corolla instead since it gets about 50% better gas mileage.

What are you doing to save on gas costs?

For more gas-saving ideas, check out these:

• Save Money by Taking the Train or Bus

• Saving on Gas Myths

• How to Cut Gas Costs

Comments

[Kevin]

I'm also watching my starts and stops, staying at or below 65 mph, carpooling with my wife when we can and trying to walk more. We also take her Protege everywhere on the weekends instead of my Jeep since we get about 10mpg more with her car.

[rwh]

Definitely drive the Corolla as much as possible. Save the Suburu for when you need the AWD.

We drive our Honda Civic everywhere. The minivan sits in the garage.

[Angeline]

I would say definitely take the corolla wherever you can. I try to be as efficient as possible: combining trips when I know there's more than one place I have to go to. I'll either wait a couple days so I can do all my errands at once, or try to plan my route so I'm not going back and forth, etc.

[Cheap Like Me]

We too drive a Subaru Forester, and we are trying some basic "hypermiling" techniques: Taking the foot off the pedal, slow accelerations, slow decelerations and avoiding any sharp braking or sharp starts, staying under 65 mph. I find that at 35 mph, the car can coast (well, drive without additional input from the gas pedal) for about three blocks. That is a significant amount of non-gas-pedal-pushing!

On a recent longer (110-mile) highway trip we put the cruise control at 55-60 mph and never went up to 75 mph. Our mileage on that tank of gas was more than 29 mpg -- and only half the miles were highway miles. Our previous best mileage was perhaps 27 or 28 mpg for a tank of all-highway miles, so it is working. Our trip took about 15 minutes longer, but if those savings become a habit, they'll add up.

[Anonymous]

Take the bus! Ride the train! Move to a neighborhood with a high walkscore! www.walkscore.com

[IT Pilgrim]

I recently have been experimenting with hypermiling. Its made a tremendous difference. I chronicled the whole thing on my site, but in short, I managed to increase my gas mileage dramatically, but almost 10 miles per gallon. It definitely has its benefits, but it has downsides as well...

[rwh]

There is a very interesting article in today's NY Times about the cost of driving. An exerpt:

While the F-250 costs $100,000 and a fully loaded F-150 — the better-known, smaller Ford pickup — costs about $70,000, a Ford Focus still costs less than $40,000 over five years. A Honda Civic Hybrid does, too. A Toyota Prius costs only a little more. A Subaru Outback station wagon runs $50,000 or so.

To put this in perspective, the difference between a Focus and an F-250 over five years is $60,000. The annual pretax income of a typical family in this country is also about $60,000. So choosing a F-250 over a Focus is like volunteering for a 20 percent pay cut. The relative resale values might cushion the blow a little, but not much.

That’s why more people are deciding that towing capacity and the other benefits of pickup trucks and S.U.V.’s are not worth the costs. The F-250 may still make sense for some business owners. But, as Mr. Fisher says, on those few occasions when the rest of us need to move some horses, we can rent a truck. “The new economics of car buying is, ‘Don’t overbuy,’ ” he told me. “Buy something you’re going to need most of the time.”

[FGC]

The Corolla's are amazing. I own one and compared to my SUV, I don't even want to step foot in my SUV anymore, it just makes me cry :(

[Scott]

I have increase my gas milege would you like to know more? I'm getting about 5 to 7 miles more on a gallon.
Scott