Why does lowering the speed limit on the highway lower your fuel consumption?
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its mostly wind resistance, aka drag. that’s after the oil embargo of the 70s cars were designed to be like jelly beans.
I remember reading about making cars (and vans like I had) more efficient. Trucks and vans used to have these big elephant ears, and car side mirros were like flat disks but putting them in bullet shaped domes saved nearly 10% gas consumption. getting rid of radio antennae and for gawd’s sake don’t fly a flag.
then they tucked the whippers under the hood
air dam under the front bumper.
racing cars will tail gate, the 2nd car gets the advantage because the front car breaks the wall of air, it rides in a lower pressure area, and oddly the front car gets an advantage too as the 2nd car redirects the whirlpool of air that would follow it and pulling it back. this method is called drafting.
anyway, cars are, for the most part, designed to move efficiently at 65 now….of course now most folks have higher profile SUVs
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