Light Truck MPG And Its Influencers
In the recent years, sales of light trucks in the US have seen an unprecedented acceleration. This has been largely due to the additional cost-effective options these vehicles provide and gradual improvement in their fuel economy ratings. It is important to know and understand the factors that influence actual light truck mpg (miles per gallon) logged vis-a-vis their respective individual EPA published federal mpg rating.
Some of these factors are outlined below.
Functionally, light trucks are required to carry passengers and cargo as well as do a bit of occasional towing or hauling. Full-fledged trucks that can comfortably accomplish these objectives (including off-road tasks) need to be heavily built and have powerful engines. Consequently, they have considerable weight and therefore low fuel economy. All this even impacts their aerodynamics and pricing adversely.
Therefore, the automobile industry came up with light trucks, which can perform all these roles, but in a somewhat 'limited' way. It provides almost all the above features that buyers would be looking for, but to provide them in a limited way so as to keep the truck weight, its fuel economy, and price optimum. The idea has caught on with the American population like fire. They have started looking at the light truck as an 'all-in-one' vehicle that provides several things all rolled into one. They look upon the light truck as a vehicle with a powerful engine, as a family car, a cargo carrier, and a hauler. The most important aspect that they have found is that it is easily maneuverable and is car-like in most of its features and better still in its fuel economy and pricing. Weight control is the most important factor that affects light truck mpg. Several factors in the construction of a light truck that impact weight in turn directly impact its fuel economy. These factors include the vehicle dimensions, material of construction, the engine weight, the curb weight, the payload, and the type of frame and body. A unit-body construction has lower weight than the body-on-frame construction. Besides this several other factors impact light truck mpg. These include engine efficiency, the type of transmission and the transmission efficiency, technological innovations in the engine that boost fuel economy, exhaust losses, and computer cruise control that maintain fuel economy at an optimum level. Techniques such as braking energy recovery and control of engine starting acceleration can also impact fuel economy. City driving is inherently at lower than optimum speed because of heavy traffic, so the mpg logged is lower than on a highway on which optimum speed can be maintained because of comparably less traffic. Besides these factors, overspeeding consumes more fuel than is required to maintain optimum mpg and must be always avoided. Sticking to 45 to 55 mpg on highways maintains fuel economy. Users can also maintain light truck mpg by taking requisite maintenance-related precautions, ensuring fuel quality, and trying to combine tasks in one trip. This last helps because the fuel consumed by a warm engine is less than with a cold engine.
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