gas mileage with a 5-speed??

[ky 2stroker]

I drive a 4 banger gmc sonoma, 2.2L 5 speed 2wd. from about every time ive checked it, I get about 24 mpg. one time on the interstate I drove about 200 miles and checked it and got like 32 mpg.

I drive like 65 miles a day going to work and back. just wondering if you guys might know any tips or secrets to getting better gas mileage? I try, most of the time to keep a light foot on the gas petal, do the speed limit (some of the time), kick it in neutral down hils and stuff, and just try to drive it easy. but I was wondering if its better to lug the motor around in a higher gear, like say going through town in a 35 mph zone, I got it in 5th gear kinda luggin it. is that killing my gas mileage or hurting the motor/tranny? or is it better to keep the lightest load possible on the engine and keep it at moderate rpms with barly givin it much push on the gas petal?

[Muffinman69]

When you are going say 60 and you are in w/e gear doing 4-5k rpm... thats when you kill gas millage and put extra strain on your engine. Toss it into a higher gear and drop the RPM's down to say 1500-2000 and cruise, that will keep your gas millage up and wont hurt anything. 1 gear higher than what you normally would drive in at a given speed is the best way to go about it.

Just remember that gears get lower ratios as they go till 4th (1:1) and 5th (0.XX:1) The less RPMs with a higher top speed usually helps you out.

Also, if you have the little radio display thing that you are reading your gas millage from, it averages it out based on speeds. So if you are constantly speeding up and slowing down like in city traffic your gas millage is going to go to shit. if you drive 200 miles at highway speeds with your car in a higher gear doing less RPMs, your millage will always gain.

Other than that there isnt much more you can do for gas millage, aside from switching out rear end gears.

[NELSON]

yes , and stay off the breaks! keep off of peoples ass so u can roll to a slow instead of waistin momentum. then u have to waste fuel speeding back up