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Hypermiling: A primer
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The author's SUV.
Hypermiling. You may have heard the word before. It's more likely that you have not. As most "new" words go, it was colloquial, a melding and adaptation of other words to explain a concept: hyper (unusually energetic, and in this use, extreme) + miling (an abuse of the word "mile" in verb tense).
Popularized during the fuel crunch of 2008, the word was legitimized when The New Oxford American Dictionary defined it, published it, and recognized it as the best new word of 2008 (money.cnn.com/2008/11/11/news/economy/wordof_year/index.htm):
HY•per•mi•ling: maximizing gas mileage by making fuel-conserving adjustments to one's car and driving techniques.
The term, when I first heard it, was featured in a network TV news story and spun as a rather quirky, crackpot behavior practiced by fanatics and, as one might expect from such a story, fanatics were located and shown on camera. They had altered their cars in questionable ways, and they engaged in some patently dangerous — if not illegal — habits in an effort to get as much out of their fuel tanks as possible. But they also spoke of minimal practices that got results, and what they said seemed logical to me.
As the owner of a fuel-thirsty mid-sized SUV — a 2002 Nissan Xterra, to be precise — I was intrigued by the concept of hypermiling. I was skeptical but willing to experiment.
With only the news feature to go on, I implemented only two of their easiest practices. I had developed a strange habit — thanks to my ex-wife — of tracking my fuel consumption and range between fill-ups, so I was already set to track any changes I might see. And see them I did, with my very first 'hypermiled' tank of gas!
Getting started
The simplest way to track any changes resulting from your practice of hypermiling is to know two things about your fuel consumption: how often you fill up, and how far you normally get on a tank of gas. So the first thing to do when you start hypermiling is to change nothing about the way you drive, but start tracking your fuel use.
The next time you fill up, fill up! Don't top off the tank, as that's dangerous, but let the pump go until the auto-shutoff engages. Make sure your tank is full (sometimes the auto-shutoff engages prematurely). Then — and this is very important — zero your trip odometer before you drive off. Most newer cars have trip odometers. There's usually a button that sticks out of, or near, your speedometer window. 
If your trip odometer is analog (the old spinning number wheels), it will be separate from the main odometer display, and when you press the button, the number wheels all rotate to zero. If your odometer is electronic, one brief press of the button will switch between displays of the main odometer and your trip odometer (sometimes there are two trip odometers, Trip 1 and Trip 2, or A and B. Pick one and pay attention to it.) Switch to the trip odometer and then press and hold the button until the number there clears to zero. (Some luxury cars have more sophisticated "data centers," and finding the function to zero your trip odometers can be confusing. Be sure to consult your operator's manual for instructions.) You may also wish to jot down the number displayed on the main odometer, as this may be important later. And that's it. Drive as normal.
You're not hypermiling, yet, but you want a set of data against which to compare your results. If you can, don't fill up again until your gas tank is almost completely empty. Let safety be your guide, but you can't get a clear idea of your results if you fill up one time at half a tank, and then the next time at just under one-quarter of a tank, and so on. Consistency is the key to getting good data, so try to fill up at the same point of minimum capacity each time. A rule of thumb to follow: most fuel tanks still have several gallons of gas in them while the fuel gauge indicator reads 'E' or the fuel warning light illuminates. Again, let safety and your comfort level be your guides to how long you wait before filling up.
Ideally, you would want to run through several tanks of gas to get a good set of data averages before you start to practice hypermiling, but it's not necessary. However, after you've started tracking your first tank of gas, you need to continue tracking how far every tank of gas gets you in order for you to see your hypermiling results.
Next time: Basic hypermiling how-tos; the importance of logging (not trees); your first results
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