Drafting???

[freds]

Hi Everyone

I brought a Tesla for my 60th birthday (it's paid for now) and took it back to Greybull WY to show it to my cousin. At the time the I-90 super charger network east bound quit at Spokane WA until you were a lot further east.

To make it I stopped at a lot of RV areas to snag a 50amp outlet for an hour or more to add 50 miles of range.

I made it into Missoula MT with three miles remaining of range only by drafting behind a semi-truck for a fair number of miles. Was definitely thinking that a tow truck would be involved that day!!!

I wound up at a motel where they let me unplug a dryer which was on two phases on three phase power so only got 192 volts instead of 240, so it took about 12 hours to charge the car where normally it would take a little over eight hours on a fully empty battery.

Question, can you significantly improve your mileage by drafting a semi?

[DoubleEagle]

Yes you can, if you are within 8' or so, but doing that might decrease your personal lifetime.

[Nova Eona]

You can also get anywhere you're going twice as fast just by doubling your speed, but there are certain flaws in both approaches.

A lot of people tend to think that the semi slamming on the brakes unexpectedly is the worst case for these scenarios, but think about the mechanical disasters that could happen - what's your reaction time if the trailing axle pops loose and suddenly gets punted your way?

Personally when driving a little car I like to give the big trucks as much room as possible - I don't even like being alongside them, let alone directly behind them.

[buswarrior]

Drafting works.

But, no time to react for road debris.

Also can't see the local authorities at roadside until too late, who will be "curious" to inquire as to your following distance...

Happy coaching!
Buswarrior

[Jim Blackwood]

If a semi driver sees a 'gator' in the road he'll probably straddle it. Where does that leave you? Broken probably and maybe wrecked.

Jim

[lostagain]

The short comings of electric vehicles that you describe are the reason I would not buy one.

Tail gating is illegal, for good reasons.

JC

[freds]

The short comings of electric vehicles that you describe are the reason I would not buy one.

Tail gating is illegal, for good reasons.

JC

Oh that was in the early days. It's not a problem now, just returned from a 2400 mile trip and had no problems due to Tesla's vast network of super chargers.

Some of the stations have high power chargers for other brands of cars though not many actual charge positions. I was at a station where there was ten Tesla spots and two other type spots...

[TomC]

My wife followed me in a rental straight truck. Her mileage at freeway speed normally is around 30. But her average was 50 with drafting.

[Jim Blackwood]

If you went 1000 miles you saved 13.3 gallons of gas. At current prices that's about $30. Is that all your life is worth?

Jim

[Knuckles]

Drafting works but you not only need to worry about road debris coming your way but i drove truck for forty years and can't even count the amount of blowouts I've had on trailers and the tire is the least of your worrys on some trailers the explosion has blown the fenders right off the trailer as well as the tire gator definitely not worth your life. Its like following a bomb not knowing when the thing will detonate

[chessie4905]

The benefit of all electric looks promising now, at least for short trips unless you want to spend the time waiting for a charge and stress of finding a charging station when needed that isnt out of order. It is just a matter of time before the savings start to evaporate. Governments are and will start taxing for not paying fuel road tax, charging fees will start rising, on and on. Diesel used to be a bargain in my cars several years ago. It was cheaper than gas. That changed when they started raising the road tax. Now diesel competes with premium gas on cost.

[Boomer]

Nuts!

[freds]

OK guys, I get it that it's a bad idea thanks for weighting in.

Though the big truck firms have plans for automated driver assist with convoying using drafting on multiple trucks. Whether that will be legal or work is still up in the air.

[Nova Eona]

Oh it will be amazing for autonomous convoying - I wouldn't be surprised at all to see an 'autonomous only' lane on big highways in the future that's a bumper-to-bumper mix of vehicles going at speeds that we'd consider reckless today, but that demands much tighter precision and coordination than our lame human brains can manage.

Electric's definitely the way of the future - honestly the biggest problems are lack of infrastructure and that our battery tech is several steps behind our motor tech, but they're making advancements every year.  Even once road tax and such all get leveled out, eventually gas and diesel will be the 'hobbyist' options.

[richard5933]

I see EVs becoming the majority of new vehicles sold much sooner than self-driving ones. Electric and ICE can co-exist easily, but as long as humans are behind the wheel of some vehicles it will be difficult to mix the technologies of self-driving and human-driven.

We humans have a tendency towards doing things irrationally, which makes it difficult for self-driving vehicles to predict our actions. Self-driving cars on a road by themselves could work in close quarters at high efficiency, but the safety margin they have to leave to allow us humans working space would take away from that. That said, I do see where HOV lanes will soon be replaced with self-driving-vehicle-only lanes which are isolated from the regular traffic. Then they can talk to each other and operate at full efficiency.