Is more fuel used going one way or the other?

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Mon 18 May 2009 13:27
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - ifithelps
My journey to work is made up of five or six miles chugging through town, 30mph limit and several junctions, followed by five or six miles easy run on a 50mph dual carraigeway.

Am I likely to use more fuel going to work - when I do the poor economy part of the journey from cold, or going home, when the car is much warmer when it reaches the stop/start section?

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Mon 18 May 2009 13:49
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - tonyrees68
More efficient coming home when car is operating at proper temperatures, when you hit the congestion , but also depends on atmospheric conditions.
tony
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Mon 18 May 2009 15:44
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - doctorchris
I always get better fuel economy returning from Carlisle to Sunderland than going out to Carlisle from Sunderland. Same road and similar speed.
Where I live in Sunderland, 57m above sea level, Carlisle, 24m above sea level.
It must be due to prevailing winds.
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Mon 18 May 2009 16:30
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - Tron
Longer return trips - the wind is a factor that has to be taken in to account.

Saw a documentary on Sky TV a few years ago that explained wind.

Within that programmes they said that wind resistance is why long haul flight operators and the military hug the gulf stream, often going hundreds of miles off route to get in to it.

All to take advantage of the 'free push' by the substantial lack of air resistance a 200+mph tail wind gives them.

Their fuel savings are huge too.

The same programme advised too that birds do the same. Swallows and Swifts being just two (as I recall) of many species that get up in to the Gulf Stream on their migrations paths.

I don't need a 'weather wind forecast' as I can see Ferrybridge, Eggborough and Drax power stations - their combined cooling towers tell me all I need to know about wind direction!
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Mon 18 May 2009 17:48
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - ifithelps
...It must be due to prevailing winds....

Doc,

I think that's right.

Same reason the Coast2Coast Whitehaven to Sunderland cycle route is much, much, easier from west to east.

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Mon 18 May 2009 18:03
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - Lud
Uphill one way, downhill the other.

Like the Pembrokeshire man who decided to slide back across Cardigan bay from Dinas Cross to Cardigan, the year it was so cold Cardigan bay froze over. Like an ice rink, it was. Dinas Cross is higher up, see, so it was downhill all the way and he was wearing his clogs. But about three quarters the way across he started slowing down. He looked back and he could see two long scratches behind him, getting deeper and deeper. What had happened, see, the clogs had worn through, and his socks and heelbones, and his legbones sratching the ice were slowing him down.

Took him ages to crawl the rest of the way.

(I was told this story as a wide-eyed ten-year-old by a Pembrokeshire adult in 1949 or so)
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Mon 18 May 2009 18:46
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - Hamsafar
Check the height above sea level at each end of journey on google earth.
It takes fuel to elevate the car's height against gravity.
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Wed 20 May 2009 00:33
Is more fuel used going one way or the other? - madux
Try driving to Spain and back - you'll use about ten gallons more on the return trip - uphill, see?
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