Thoughtful driving

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Wavebender

Well-known member
Joined
Apr 7, 2021
Messages
67
Location
Boise ID USA
It may turn out that EVs will benefit the world as much by thoughtful driving habits as they will by not burning fossil fuels.

In the two weeks since she got her Leaf, the car has totally changed her driving style. She has always been a bit of a lead foot, with frequent braking and random speed changes if she was talking while driving — I’m tempted to call it a “push-pull” effect as a passenger. Now she barely ever touches her brake pedal as she smoothly accelerates and decelerates from stop to stop. She stays off the freeway whenever possible, using her extensive knowledge of our backroads; I swear this woman has a AAA map in her head and a bird-like sense of direction that I’ll never have.

She’s also wrecked more than her share of cars. I can think of five off the top of my head. But I have a feeling that her newfound thoughtful driving will (please please please) end that unfortunate run.

Anyone else see this positive trend in their own driving style?
 
I used to 'Hot Rod' a fair amount in my Civics, but this has become both rare and more limited in the 8 years I've been driving a Leaf. I will still occasionally "punch it" if I'm in a hurry and there isn't any traffic around me, but now it's just for a few seconds. I generally drive like a Little Old Man now.
 
Wavebender said:
Anyone else see this positive trend in their own driving style?
I mostly drive our Tesla and it is probably telling that I find our LEAF to be gutless. But deep down I am the quintessentially annoying Prius driver so my present day driving must be some combination thereof.

As I sometimes remind my wife when she harps about my aggressive driving, the driver with the best fuel economy (by far) in the family is not her.
 
I also used to "hot rod in my civics" however since Prius days I have done various eco driving, changing the game if you will. All the feedback on energy usage, regen/power meter, overall efficency stats helped calm me down a lot most of the time. There are still times I will punch it when in a hurry but not like in my pure ICE (civic) days.

My wife however as I can see right in the driving efficiency in the app when she drives does not. I keep trying to get her to brake more slowly not only for brake wear but a good habit for snow (she is from southern Japan no snow) so she does not crash. No luck yet but she is very careful when it snows and limits driving. While her acceleration is harder than it needs to be it is the braking I am more concerned about.
 
My wife also calls me an old man the way I drive our Leafs in am efficient manner. Once in a while I also punch it, but almost immediately return to old man driving to keep that efficiency up. My wife doesn't care and drives normally. The 3s (and even some 2s in winter) she usually produces for efficiency are quite painful to watch, but I do respect her for driving an ev like a normal car, and not feeling like she needs to baby it. I stopped complimenting her when she got a 5 or better in summer because she felt like I was spying.

That maybe the one thing I miss in the S+ over the SV+ is the telematics for keeping track of efficiency.
 
Driving a Leaf, even part time since ours is my wife's daily driver, has changed my habits. I'm accelerating slower, braking easier, and trying to be more aware of traffic ahead so I can coast instead of brake. I'm also a fan of being quick off the line for something like an on ramp, but that's not an every stop occurrence.

I've found that the energy efficiency stats more than anything have changed how I drive my ICE. The Leaf has made me much more aware of how much extra energy spirited acceleration and high top speeds cost. I always knew it was more, but with an ICE it's harder to notice. A dip in my avg MPG isn't very fast feedback, but a real(ish) time energy consumption gauge sure is!
 
G3NG4R said:
I've found that the energy efficiency stats more than anything have changed how I drive my ICE. The Leaf has made me much more aware of how much extra energy spirited acceleration and high top speeds cost. I always knew it was more, but with an ICE it's harder to notice. A dip in my avg MPG isn't very fast feedback, but a real(ish) time energy consumption gauge sure is!

The problem with even modern ICE is the MPG gauge on them is highly skewed in favor of the manufacture to show good economy when others doing real test that measure the actual gas usage show them off by over +20%
https://www.edmunds.com/fuel-economy/your-fuel-economy-gauge-is-fibbing.html

It's too bad because I remember my old Buick showing 32 MPG on trips but the amount of gas having to put into the tank didn't make sense if it was really getting that good of mileage at 75 MPH :lol: I figured out why long ago and never trusted any efficiency gauge in an ICE again.
 
I've never hot-rodded a civic. In fact, I used to hypermile it. At one point I got a measured 50MPG from a stock civic hatchback (filled the tank, drove 200 miles on the highway, and re-filled the tank with only 4 gallons).

When I had a Leaf, my driving habits changed. I drove more slowly, although I would sometimes "jack-rabbit" start at lights just for fun.

When I upgraded to a Bolt, I stopped caring about economy around town, and drove less efficiently than I used to drive my old civic. But for trips, I still drove very carefully since DCFC infrastructure was sparse and unreliable.

In recent years, the DCFCs have really filled in. As a result, I am no longer as careful even on road trips. I know that I can stop sooner to charge if needed, so I don't have to hypermile to that one DCFC 180 miles from the current one.

So in the end, no, I don't think thoughtful driving will stick. I think it will come full circle. Eventually, we will be worse off as everyone gets a car that can do 0-30 in 2 seconds and 0-60 in <6 seconds. When that's the norm, roads (especially intersections!) will be far more dangerous than they already are.
 
GetOffYourGas said:
So in the end, no, I don't think thoughtful driving will stick. I think it will come full circle. Eventually, we will be worse off as everyone gets a car that can do 0-30 in 2 seconds and 0-60 in <6 seconds. When that's the norm, roads (especially intersections!) will be far more dangerous than they already are.
This is what I think I see with Tesla. The TMC forum is chock full of accident reports soon after car purchase. Many of them are of drivers that run into the Tesla from behind. So the Tesla driver is not 'at fault' according to the law but I'm inclined to think the accidents are happening to aggressive Tesla drivers who accelerate, and then brake, rapidly.
 
GetOffYourGas said:
So in the end, no, I don't think thoughtful driving will stick. I think it will come full circle. Eventually, we will be worse off as everyone gets a car that can do 0-30 in 2 seconds and 0-60 in <6 seconds. When that's the norm, roads (especially intersections!) will be far more dangerous than they already are.

I couldn't agree more. In fact, I often wonder if the entire climate change catastrophe could be avoided by something as simple as everyone driving at the speed limit whether or not we as a species could do that. Of course, that won't be enough but I think even that small step is asking too much for our society in its present state.
 
I think he's right too while the prius and LEAF taught me to hypermile I think most will want to enjoy that instant torque of modern EVs.

On DCFC assuming you have charging available whereever you go you may still save time driving efficiently vs charging, your Bolt for example only charges at 50kw. I am sure some day not too far off we'll have 500kw fast charging where even that time will no longer matter. Most people will not think of time charging vs speed, I agree with that. I also agree about intersections becoming more dangerous. When I think what I did with a Honda I can only imagine with youth will do with future EVs with that torque. Not sure how good I feel but someone remembers who I was and seems to think this grey guy with kids and a mortgage should get back into street racing, um no that was a long time ago.

Around town or even a few towns you can just charge at home so yea I get not bothering with efficient driving, I relaxed a fair bit myself especially since I have solar which even this last month supplied all power I used including car charging even with our snow.

I've been interacting with some EV groups and doing events, I have one this weekend actually. I find most of the EV drivers never even heard of hypermiling and know nothing about efficient driving. I think we are a minority.
 
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