Why does braking gradually and accelerating slowly give a car better gas mileage?

Question

Does this advice apply to all cars?

In: 156

Answer 1

Basically everytime you touch the gas pedal you are turning gasoline into kinetic energy (and heat because thermodynamics always wins), and every time you touch the brake you are turning kinetic energy into heat. The more time you coast without touching either pedal the more distance you travel for a given amount of kinetic energy.