Saving Fuel Drafting a Freightliner????

[bmoeller]

She gets around eventually and is mouthing something at me, I should of blew the train horns, her window was down. heh.

Horn broke, watch for finger!

 

[Kennywould]

I used to drive a tri-axle and people would do it to me but one night I had to swerve to miss a steel horse with one of those blinking yellow lights on it and I did not know there was anyone behind me. My guess is that they don't draft big trucks much anymore!!! It is a stupid thing to do plain and simple!

 

[rubberneck]

I had a chick in a really nice BMW "drafting" me while towing my 35' gooseneck a while back. I tried slowing down, speeding up, changing lanes, she would not get off my buttt. So after about 15 min of this, here it comes. An entire thrown tread right in the middle of my lane. I swerved last second, she did not. Bet that bumper cover was really expensive. :-laf

 

[WDixon27]

i wonder if now after the mythbusters showed a 20-40% mileage improvement from drafting it will become more common to drive up the butt of a truck, atleast from those who didn't know it was possible

 

[Rotty]

When I heard this was coming on the show, I said uhoh,every id10t will now try drafting and cause more accidents. Unfortunatly, some people never learn. #@$%!

My belief is trucker are working hard for a living, give em a break, they drive 10-100 times more miles with enough problems. Even at the big truck pumps, if a trucker pulls in behind me waiting to fill up, I just hurry up and get out of his way. I just push the level to fill the fastest on the third notch. I just did this for the first time last week and man, I filled my tank in record time something like 2-3 minutes for 27gal. . :-laf

 

[The patriot]

Sorry if I came off a little harsh. I didnt like being tailgated, and still dont.

Having driven trucks for a living, I dont like to even be near them while I'm in a car.

Leave drafting to Nascar drivers. OK?:-laf

You wouldnt want someone who's not a doctor doing surgery on you, would ya?

"I'm not a doctor... . but I did stay at a Hoilday inn last night. "

 

[Kennywould]

When I heard this was coming on the show, I said uhoh,every id10t will now try drafting and cause more accidents.

You may have a good point! I am glad I don't drive big trucks anymore, except for my Mega Cab :-laf! I just give em some soot to snack on with those pipes down nice and low something we didn't have in a big truck!

 

[klenger]

This topic reminds me of the semi driver complaing about some woman in a car driving in his blind spot for 30 miles. He would slow down, speed up, etc, and she stayed right there. When he pulled over at a rest stop, she followed and he (quite angry #@$%! ) asked what the heck she was doing. Response: "I wanted to stay in the shade of your truck to keep the sun out of my eyes".

 

[juicedcummins]

The $ you think you are going to save in fuel will never offset the cost to repair your winshied, lights, or paint if you duck in behind me for any unwarranted length of time.

You would not believe what 30 tires can kick up on command.

 

[MEby]

sounds like most of us dont like tailgaters, me included. When people tailgate me I always worry i'll lose something, hit the tailgater and get sued. :-{}



I dont drive semi, just a medium duty.

 

[Flinty]

I had a chick in a really nice BMW "drafting" me while towing my 35' gooseneck a while back. I tried slowing down, speeding up, changing lanes, she would not get off my buttt. So after about 15 min of this, here it comes. An entire thrown tread right in the middle of my lane. I swerved last second, she did not. Bet that bumper cover was really expensive. :-laf

You should see what a dead deer will do to a car. There was a car in the on coming lane and the deer was in the middle of a corner in the road, nothing to do but straddle it. The rear diff hit but the axles on the gooseneck cleared. The impatient person tailgating me did not fair as well. If you've been on the Swan highway in Montana you know what I mean. Sometimes you can't save people from themselves. Drafting a semi... How would you explain that wreck? If you lived to tell. Oh well, I've certainly done my fair share of stupid things, the trick is learning from them and the experience of others.

 

[bmoeller]

US 61 up near Dubuque, Ia can get bad with dead deer as well.

Over the winter, I was up through there twice in a week to pick up a load, and it looked like a war zone both times. Blood and guts all over the place for several miles. I never hit one, but did have to power wash guts off of the KW.

NEVER seen it that bad before.

 

[Bertram65]

I don't see why if you are driving a truck, either big rig or full size Dodge, you care so much about being tailgated, people do it to me all the time, half the time I can barely see them, usually some small import or sports car. On the highway they will usually go around eventually, but my 5 mile trip to and from work is all backroads and I like to drive the speed limit, really enrages some people, the way I look at it is, I will not get hurt if I have to stop quickly, my truck my get damaged but I have my draw bar in with a 2 5/16" ball on so they will have to come through that first before they will get my bumper, plus I am so much higher than them they will probably go under to some extent. The one time I really don't like being tailgated is on the highway by big rigs, alot of them think they own the road and will run up on you in the merge lane, really stupid, the merge lane is for merging onto the highway,not trying to make time or maintain 65mph.

I trying to give up trying to change all the idiots bad habits, it is a waste of time.

 

[rubberneck]

You should see what a dead deer will do to a car. There was a car in the on coming lane and the deer was in the middle of a corner in the road, nothing to do but straddle it. The rear diff hit but the axles on the gooseneck cleared. The impatient person tailgating me did not fair as well. If you've been on the Swan highway in Montana you know what I mean. Sometimes you can't save people from themselves. Drafting a semi... How would you explain that wreck? If you lived to tell. Oh well, I've certainly done my fair share of stupid things, the trick is learning from them and the experience of others.

My father in law just got his honda pilot back from the body shop after some inadvertent roadway deer hunting:-laf hit so hard, could not open either front door, and cracked windsheild 6k worth of damage:{

 

[Missouri Mule]

My brother used to draft semi's with a VW BUG all the time going back and forth to college. He said he got about 50 miles per gallon when he did it.

 

[bmoeller]

I don't see why if you are driving a truck, either big rig or full size Dodge, you care so much about being tailgated, people do it to me all the time, half the time I can barely see them, usually some small import or sports car.

It is called "safe stopping distance". And as said before deer and blown tires.



Sure, I could get hit from the rear, and probably not get hurt, but that is beside the point. It is simply irresponsible. And I don't need to have my time wasted by some ahole that causes an accident or having to deal with fixing my rig.

 

[ROADWARRIOR]

Is it also true that the truck being drafted will lose mileage? If true, how much?



Thanks,

Dan

 

[DZink24]

Because nobody wants to take responsibility for their actions

I don't see why if you are driving a truck, either big rig or full size Dodge, you care so much about being tailgated, people do it to me all the time, half the time I can barely see them, usually some small import or sports car. On the highway they will usually go around eventually, but my 5 mile trip to and from work is all backroads and I like to drive the speed limit, really enrages some people, the way I look at it is, I will not get hurt if I have to stop quickly, my truck my get damaged but I have my draw bar in with a 2 5/16" ball on so they will have to come through that first before they will get my bumper, plus I am so much higher than them they will probably go under to some extent. The one time I really don't like being tailgated is on the highway by big rigs, alot of them think they own the road and will run up on you in the merge lane, really stupid, the merge lane is for merging onto the highway,not trying to make time or maintain 65mph.

I trying to give up trying to change all the idiots bad habits, it is a waste of time.

I will speak for myself as well as many other truckers on the road. The reason we do not like being tailgated is because as a DOT driver, with a CDL, we are/will be scrutinized, taken out of service, as well as our rigs will be searched mechanically with a fine toothed comb for ANYTHING, whether or not it has/had anything to do with an accident, if there is a fatality or major injury. If people were willing to take responsibility for their actions, fine, tailgate me, but I am willing to bet that if one dies or is crippled after a major rear-end/tailgating accident, the truck company will be getting a call from the injured parties lawyer about a lawsuit...

 

[ezcurra]

Is it also true that the truck being drafted will lose mileage? If true, how much?



Thanks,

Dan

I would venture to guess that the truck would get slightly better fuel economy. The vehicle behind is probably affecting the turbulence behind the truck, causing the low pressure area to be smaller (and of higher pressure), reducing drag for the truck. Just a guess.

 

[jwgary]

I would venture to guess that the truck would get slightly better fuel economy. The vehicle behind is probably affecting the turbulence behind the truck, causing the low pressure area to be smaller (and of higher pressure), reducing drag for the truck. Just a guess.

You do get a base drag reduction in the lead vehicle by having something behind it. We have to watch that closely in wind tunnel testing. When we have a long model, the aft end can get too close to the area of the support out the back that flares out. That structure back there causes what looks like a thrust on the model because of the reduction in drag as the streamlines don't have to bend as much to go around the base of the model. You can even see reflected shock waves, but that is only for supersonic stuff, not semis:-laf. For low speed vehicles (that are greatly affected by drag), we even do a base drag correction where we take out the center support and support at the wing tips to correct the thrust we see off of the sting support.