Your mileage may vary

Bruce from Can.

Well-known Member
One of Loren the ACG?s lines, picked up no doubt
from a old advertising campaign. And it does create
something to think on. Do you find that you use
less, more or about the same fuel these days as
you might have over the past few years? We are
still farming the same amount of ground, but use
less fuel now. Mostly because we have move more
away from row crops, corn and cereal grains, and
more towards hay. My current pickup truck gets 25
mpg compared to my old 89 F150 that only
managed 12 mpg. Has your consumption gone up
or down?
 
1) My current pickup truck gets 25 mpg

That must be a 6 cylinder.
I have a 2015 Ram single cab with the Hemi.
I get 18 to 19 mpg and that is only possible if I do not let my wife drive it.


2) When I was younger the move was toward small 4 cylinder cars as brands like Toyota were becoming big on the USA market.
Today our kids have frowned on small gas conserving cars for big comfort.
With this in mind you got to think the average American is using more gasoline than his father was or at least more than what he could be using.
 
Using less here as well. No til has cut fuel use by 25 percent. Every pickup I buy gets better mileage than the previous one. And with no kids underfoot, the Suburban was traded for a four cylinder Impala.Switched from oil heat to geothermal....No fuel used, 25 percent increase in hydro bill over the winter months, but saving around 500 a month in the winter.

Oh, yeah, no more livestock means no more hay to bale, silage to cut,feed to grind, water bowls to heat etc...!

Ben
 
The K20 Cheyenne I drove after high school got 12 mpg. The diesel car I drive now gets 45.

No hay these days but all row crop acres have been changed to strip-till and no -till. Farm fuel usage is about the same though as we have added acres.
 
I am like Eric farming more ground but using less fuel. Real years were around early 70s had a D19 gas AC tractor and would need fuel at dinner then a G AC gas combine would just about burn gas faster than you could put it in it. All this latter stuff does more work with less fuel. 20/20 Ford F150 Eco=Boost has about 8 thousand miles on it now and is still over 22 MPG overall.
 
jm,
I checked my mileage on the way to Florida. 28+ mpg at 75+ mph. I have an alarm go off when speed reaches 80 mph.
Mileage went south driving around Florida.
Instead of mileage, I look at Cost per mile. 2500 miles cost $225 in gas.
Under ten cents a mile isn't bad for a V6.
geo.
 
14 Ram with the Hemi runs 19mpg,hwy 21. Not bad for a truck. My 350 Chevy 2500,10 to 12 mpg.
 
So far I have been able to stay around that 10 cents figure , the price of gas has been helping that. We are leaving at daylight for Canton Texas for a few days. If I stay under 75 mph mine really does well after 75 it drops fast.
 
Our fuel usage on a per acre basis, has gone down steadily over the last 15 years. We are doing fewer passes with more multifunction equipment. Also the tractors are more fuel efficient. As for vehicles, I would say the same thing. The wife's car gets in the mid to upper 20 MPG even just running local. My running around pickup gets around 15 MPG when my old one got around 12-13 MPG.
 
I don't even want to talk about my 6.7 gets after spending a lot of money to purify it. I bought it in Sep 2010 and it rolled over 38K with worn out Michelin 20" tires. The tires are as junkie as the truck. To bad that I can't hook the GN on my Toyota Sienna.
 

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