Fuel Efficiency With Roof Rack

The empty roof rack had a nearly 2 percent impact on fuel economy which translates to a little more than three quarters of a gallon of gas.

Fuel efficiency with roof rack.

Some drivers may see their gas mileage drop by as much as 20 percent depending on vehicle type and type of roof rack. Generally adding a loaded roof rack to your car will lower your gas mileage by at least 10 percent. An empty rack has been reported to increase the cost of fuel over time from anywhere from 1 to 15 while a fully loaded roof rack will add 20 to 50 to your fuel bill. The roof rack mpg experiment he compared the gas mileage of his car at 54 7 mph 88 kph with 1 no roof racks 2 an empty roof rack and 3 a mountain bike on the roof rack.

According to a new study by yuche chen and alan meier published in the most recent issue of energy policy roof racks are responsible for 0 8 of light duty vehicle fuel consumption in 2015 corresponding to 100 million gallons of gasoline per year. Mileage went from 41 mpg at 65 mph to 40 mpg. They found that in 2015 roof racks nationwide were responsible for 0 8 percent of light duty vehicle fuel consumption or 100 million gallons of gasoline. The control test the tourx without roof rails.

This editor many years ago in a move across the country to oregon from michigan found that the highway mileage of a four cylinder accord dropped from more than 40 mpg down to 32 mpg with a. Off the showroom floor the regal tourx gets 21 miles per gallon in the city and 29 mpg highway for a combined fuel economy of 24 mpg. They found that in 2015 roof racks nationwide were responsible for 0 8 percent of light duty vehicle fuel consumption or 100 million gallons of gasoline. Their study was published recently in the journal energy policy in a paper titled fuel consumption impacts of auto roof racks.

I ll justify these numbers below. Their study was published recently in the. He found that compared to the baseline of no roof rack the empty rack reduced his mpg by 12 7 and the roof rack with a bicycle reduced it by a whooping 27 3. So if your car usually gets 30 mpg on the highway and you add a full roof rack your highway gas mileage will drop to 24 27 mpg.

Next we equipped a set of roof racks and a bike carrier attachment to the roof of the forester brimmed the tank once more and set off completing the exact same run a second time.