Miles per gallon is a statistic used to compare the efficiency of cars. The more miles per gallon a car gets, the less fuel it uses, and therefore, the smaller the environmental footprint it leaves. If you consistently track how many miles per gallon your car is getting, you will notice if the car's efficiency suddenly drops, which can alert you to a possible problem with the car that needs repair.
How to Calculate Miles Per Gallon
Calculating miles per gallon can be done manually if your car does not automatically calculate it for you. To calculate it, fill your car's gas tank until it is full and turn the trip odometer back to zero. The next time you fill up your tank, make sure it is full. Then divide the number of miles on the trip odometer by the number of gallons of gas that you put in the car to get the car's miles per gallon. For example, if you put in 15 gallons of gas and drove 315 miles, your car got 21 miles per gallon.
Ways to Improve Efficiency
To help a car run as efficiently as possible, there are several things that you can do. First, drive the speed limit on the expressways. A car's miles per gallon will increase as the speed increases, but only up to a point. After about 60 miles per hour, the car's efficiency goes down substantially. When on the highway, use cruise control to improve efficiency. You can also take anything you don't need out of your car, because the heavier the car, the more energy it takes to run it.
Gallons Per Mile
An increasingly popular alternative to miles per gallon is gallons per mile. The most common number used for mileage is 10,000 because that is about how much the average American drives per year. To get gallons per mile, divide the total mileage by the miles per gallon the car gets. For example, if your car got 25 miles per gallon, you would divide 10,000 by 25 to find that you would need to buy 400 gallons.
This alternative statistic is helpful, because it shows the difference in how many gallons of gas you will have to buy between two cars with different miles-per-gallon ratings. For example, if you were considering one car that got 14 miles per gallon and another car that got 17 miles per gallon, you would have to buy an additional 126 gallons of fuel if you purchased the car that only got 14 miles per gallon even though it is only a 3-mile-per-gallon difference. If the two cars you were considering got 30 and 45 miles per gallon, if you purchased the car that got 30 miles per gallon you would only have to buy 111 extra gallons per mile even though there is a difference of 15 miles per gallon.
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