You Get Bad Gas Mileage Because You Want To!

The first time I heard that it ticked me off, until I realized... they were right.

There are so many things I could do to increase mileage it wasn't even funny. And I'm not talking about the hypermiling stuff that will drive you crazy, but all the "little" things.

Take something as simple as lubrication. Engine, transmission, ball joints, and bearings all have friction and all need to be lubricated. The Oil Change shops have "conditioned" us to change our oil every 3,000 miles, but the Manufacturers most now recommend 7,500 miles which has a safety factor of 50% built in.

Oil is oil isn't it? Well, yes and no! Oil "shear strength" is what tells you how "good" an oil is. The lower the shear strength the worse it is. Natural oils have the worse shear strength regardless of the "additives". Semi-synthetics are better, and full synthetics are the best. Of all the oils tested (which are 100's) Mobil 1 is good and Amsoil's Signature Series full synthetic as been shown to be the best.

I've personally only run full synthetic motor oils since 1986 and my engines don't show any wear, even with 228,000 miles on my current engine. Why anyone would run anything but synthetics that don't need changing for 20,000 miles is beyond me. They pay for themselves many times over in increased mileage alone.

Then there are the Oil Additives; STP, Prolong, Duralube, Lucas, etc. We know they exist, but less than 10% of Americans use them, let alone even ever TRIED them. Why? Who knows, maybe we don't believe the claims to increased mileage, maybe no one ever explained what they can do. Do they work?, sure, but for a limited time, mostly by coating the walls of the cylinder with teflon, ptfe, or graphite. But they are short lived and usually require a continued diet of adding it to your oil EVERY time you change your oil and the FTC came down hard on unrealistic claims.

And last, the metal treatment processes. Where Oil Additives ONLY coat the metal, treatment or conditioning processes actually bond to the metal or even change the molecular structure of the metal. Companies like 300 Below is expensive, time, and energy consuming to remove the engine and have it cryo'd to 300 degrees below zero, but is worth it, just not for the average Joe. Metal conditioners like the Super Lubers engine conditioner that with nano-technology actually bonds to the metal inside the cylinder and reduces friction so much that I couldn't help but get an additional 4.5 miles per gallon often giving 15%-20% increase in mileage.

So you see, I really was getting lower gas mileage because I wanted to.

Nicholas St Jon - as an associate of Johnathan Goodwin and Uli Kruger, I've become well versed in engine efficiencies. Combined with my experience on the Space Shuttle program and work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, figuring out how to make things work better has become a way of life. As the Electric Vehicle consultant on the LincVolt project, we expect to get Neil Young's classic 1959 Lincoln Continental well over the 50 mpg goal and push it to the 100 mpg target mileage. You can keep track of our progress by joining our free Newsletter at:
http://ShopGoodwinConcepts.com
And if you know someone that would like to get 20-30 mpg out of an H1 or H2 Hummer:
http://JohnathanGoodwin.com/diesel-conversions.php


By Nicholas St Jon