Hello I am new here. I have an 03 HCH with 61,000 miles. I think I have fairly good driving technique, but reading more here, I know there's room for improvement. Where can I learn more about Hypermilage driving. I always use CC, even when climbing hills. I maintain my cruse speed up hill, and cancel CC to coast down hill. Should I cancel out of CC before the hill and let my speed slow down while climbing? I drive a lot of cross country and I find the biggest factor in MPG is wind direction. The difference in a tail wind or head wind can be more than 10 MPG!

Has anyone made any performance or instrumentation mods to their hybrids? I haven't, but I would like to see instrumention that measures wind speed and GPS ground speed, then calculates a delta, kind of like in an airplane. Also it would be interesting to see a cluster of volt and amp meters that show actuall IMA battery volategs and charging current.

I think manufactores should install Smart Cruise Controll in their Hybrids. The CC would be interfaced with GPS road mapping and radar proximity sensors. The CC would adjust speed for traffic (like some high end cars do now), adjust speed for elevation changes (that it knows in advance from GPS road map data), and adjusts speed in relation to wind speed and direction. Perhaps there could be a dash button to switch between regular and smart CC mode. For example if you're driving in a lot of trafic you may not want the speed to be varying with elevation change.

see all you guys later

-Eric

2003 Honda Civic Hybrid
1999 Acura NSX Alex Zanardi Edition #02
1993 Toyota MR2 Turbo