Do AERODYNAMICS Effect MPG?

Aerodynamics and mpgOf all the factors contributing to poor gas mileage; your car's drag co-efficient is probably not at the forefront of your mind. Well the shape of your auto determines whether it cuts through the wind like a hot knife in butter or plunges through like a big square brick. Countless hours and millions of dollars are spent in the wind tunnels of the largest car companies trying to lower that drag co-efficient to minimal levels. A vehicle like a hummer is at the very high end of the scale with a drag coefficient of 26.5! While the compact gas sipper Honda Insight is at the low end with a paltry 5.10. So all things being equal....the body style of the Insight is much suitable for a car that can get more than 40 miles per gallon without breaking a sweat.

How many times have you heard that as a truck owner it is beneficial to drop the tailgate when driving on the freeway?  Well let me tell you my friend that the best way to save gas in a pick-up truck is to get a tonneau cover. The slicker the surface area and the less amount of direction the honda-insight-hybridwind has to change the better for your drag coefficient.  I know the wheel covers on the rear of the Insight is UGLY.  But you don’t drive a Hybrid for the looks do you?

The design of the Old Skool Insight was so 90’s.  Fast forward to today and with the release of the redesigned Insight, we get a familiar wedged shaped hybrid with almost the same drag coefficient as the ultra slippery 1-st generation Insight. Thank God the Honda engineers took looks into consideration this time around!

2010 insight

Source: Wikipedia Automobile Drag Coefficient

Hybrid Car Sale Causes People to Lose Minds!

carpool-lane-stickerWatch a used hybrid sale is like watching those crazy “Brides to Be” fight over Wedding Dresses at the year-end sale.  Why all the drama for a used Civic Hybrid? Well it’s that Little Yellow CARB Sticker that causes people to go completely insane!

Life is good when you’re flying by those peons stuck in Southern California traffic!  Want to become the envy of working-class drones everywhere? Well it is pretty impossible these days unless you have connections.   I mean, only 60k of these stickers were passed out by the lovely California gov.  Now they are all kaput!

There are only 2 ways to get a car pool lane sticker.

  1. Contact your local shady guy.  He will go on the black market and buy one. Then sell it to you at double the agreed upon price.
  2. Buy a car with a little yellow car pool sticker on it already.

So really, do you want a Civic or a Prius; because that’s your only choices.  Actually you can get an Old Skool Insight.  Good Luck!  Or you could buy a car that runs on Compressed Natural Gas or GNG.  But those exploded every 10k miles.

So bite the bullet, knock a few “Brides to Be” out, then buy a Honda Certified Hybrid.

A town like Los Angeles has the traffic as emotionally painful as waterboarding.  So do yourself a favor and grab a hybrid.