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2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I have no idea how to estimate fuel economy on something like this. I do know that a gallon of gasoline will get me about 1 1/2 hours of grass cutting. But that's a lot harder on the tractor than just cruising along in 7th gear. I figure my pickup truck would use about 1/3 gallon of fuel on that trip, while my Intrepid would use about 1/5. My uncle's Corolla would use about 1/9th, maybe?
Now I'm hungry. I need a fudge bar.
(of course, that means that when I do finally get around to cutting the grass, it'll probably use even more gas, since it'll be higher and harder to cut. :sick: )
Honestly, though, I don't think biking and walking is the answer. I've worked with guys who sometimes bike to work. Let's just say I can smell them coming. Hygiene invariably suffers. More biking also means more laundry, with more water heated by fossil fuels.
Biking is very dangerous nowadays. Too many cars on the road. I respectfully beg this forum's excellent host to abandon his Schwinn. It's not worth becoming road-kill for a few pounds of birdseed. :sick:
There are plenty of ways to save $$$$ FOR gas, instead of saving money ON gas. As noted above, dump bottled water. Like milk? Buy a half gallon of full milk and add a half gallon water; you won't know the difference. Add bread crumbs to meat. Don't buy coffee at Starbucks. Shower at the gym instead of at home. Dump cable tv. Switch to a cheaper cell phone plan. Stop going to movies. Stop watering your lawn.
But as always, Drive, drive, drive!!!! It's the American way.
You can save gas even when you're NOT in the car! :-)
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
I watch those 'Most Shocking Cop Moments' shows now and then and I gotta tell ya, it's a miracle more accidents don't happen in "normal" automotive traffic movement on our hiways and biways.
Notice how many idiots are bashing in to cops and/or the people they pull over, while the inquest/possible arrest is going on? We've got way too many intoxicates driving around and way too many people that never should have been issued a driver's license actively driving around on our roads IMO.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Of course, I also try to stay off bad roads. Also I have to say that where I live, people are well trained to tolerate bikes. Not so in all parts of the country.
In reality you have to ask yourself how often does this really happen? Sure they have plenty of footage of that happening but they have plenty of footage of it not happening too, but thats not what people want to see in these shows. My point is for every one of those how many stops that go on where nothing happens? Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands?
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I never understand why we have gotten to the point of having these lawns that are so much work and expense. I rather play tennis or go to the beach on my days off.
The goat will eat your grass without burning gasoline...
...and you can rent him to your neighbors so they can save gas, too!
:P
IMO goat cheese is nasty. :sick:
I had actually thought about getting a goat or two, but I dunno if I'd be zoned for it. They're picky about that kind of stuff around here. I'm on about 4.25 acres, but about 2.75 is forest/wetland/etc. There's about an acre up front toward the road, which includes the house, garage, driveway, outbuildings, etc, and about a half acre strip in back.
I'd just as soon let the strip in back grow up, but we've always kept it trimmed, in case we ever wanted to build a house back there. Back in the 80's, my Mom and stepdad toyed around with the idea, but nothing ever became of it. And I doubt if anybody else in our family ever will, either. The neighbor always thanks me for keeping it cut, though. I think partly because, to the casual observer, it makes her yard look bigger because people might then think that's part of her yard, but they're also afraid of snakes back there, and they think that keeping the grass cut will keep the snakes away.
I am letting parts of the yard down towards the road grow up, though. I have to be careful though, because I think they can actually get on you for not cutting your grass around here.
Thanks for the visual andre - I really needed that.....
me: I'm not even going to take the bait, and get into ownership and constitutional rights here; let's just say your community thinks a picturesque lawn is worth several thousands of gal of gas (townwide)? Hmm, that doesn't motivate me much to change my lifestyle so your townspeople can burn gas for pretty lawns.
Aspen Colorado once ran a live salamander for public office and he....won....(sort of a protest vote you might say).
I ran out of gas whacking weeds on the rider yesterday, so there's another $4.
Oh hell, if I could get away with it, I'd just let everything grow up, except right around the driveway, house, garage, etc. Unfortunately though, if I quit cutting the grass, all I'd really get is a bunch of tall, unruly grass. And eventually these mutant wild flowering pear trees with thorns on them would start taking over. No lie, they really are mutants. We have a local gov't farm where they used to do research and experiments, and back in the 30's or whatever, they were messing around with some kind of flowering pear tree. It started cross-polinating with the local pear trees, and all of the offspring have thorns on them! And they grow much faster than the stickerball trees, maples, and especially oaks, so they just crowd everything out.
Supposedly, our surrounding area has gotten a few other "presents" from that government farm, such as Japanese Knotweed and honeysuckle bushes.
So basically, in the areas of the yard I'm trying to let re-forest, I've planted the trees that I want there, and have to cut around them, until they get established at least.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Here are the highlights...
$15.50: Uncle's Corolla (drove Grandma down to my Mom's for mother's day, filled it up before giving it back to him)
$42.50: Silverado
$54.15: Buddy's Xterra. He drove me up to PA to pick up a '79 NYer, and I paid to fill up his tank when we got back.
$44.15: Intrepid
$36.20: Intrepid
$28.25: Silverado
$32.00: Uncle's Corolla (borrowed it to drive to Carlisle and back)
$25.50: Silverado
$54.60: Filled up the NYer I bought from PA.
$55.31: Filled up Intrepid, plus a 5-gallon container for lawn equipment.
Total fuel bill for the billing period: $377.71. I get a 3% rebate using my AAA card, so the actual is a bit less than what adding up the above numbers would come to.
Anyway, last month's fuel bill was $291.68 in comparison. Sounds bad at first. But if you subtract out me filling up my buddy's Xterra, plus having to fill up that NYer, that knocks off almost $110 right there.
If we all dump our gas mowers, string trimmers and obnoxious gas leaf blowers, just think of how low the price of gas will go. I'm not giving up my gas chipper/shredder though. :shades:
I think my gasoline bill is abbout $100/month with mmy 5.7L V-8. Living 4 miles from work, and other driving being optional, the cost of gas is not goiing to affect me directly.
Who can do nice blueprints around here?
RoboMower
Well there's a lot of different types of buffalograss. They have been engineered for different climates. I'd think that a sandy soil would be better than the clay soil that I grew it in. Anyway, my grass looked like crap the first year. It looked decent the second year and it wasn't until the next year that it looked really good. So there's some patience involved. Here's what I used. I recommend it highly.
http://www.stockseed.com/buffalograsses_product_display.asp?pid=424
Holy smokes! $1,700! For the smaller one! At Costco!!
My question is, I was under the impression you didn't drive all that much, and therefore weren't too concerned about mileage?
I dunno, my total fuel bill is running around $160/month right now with $3.40 gas, and I typically drive in excess of 2000 miles/month.
I realize that you have a classic fleet there, in which fuel economy was never a top design priority. By contrast, I have boring transportation cars right now. Would you personally make any changes with $4 gas?
And hey, if the roommate is driving the Intrepid for his commute, how come you are paying for the gas??
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Just Visiting
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
I can tell I'm in better shape. Used to take me a couple of trips to bring in $20 of groceries. Now it's a piece of cake!
They have them, there was a guy down the street from me that had one, yes had one. Not sure if it walked away on its own or had a little help but its gone now.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
Of course, I recently lost 27 lbs, so I shouldn't even notice!
Hey, since I've lost 10% of my body weight could that explain my 10% increase in fuel mileage?
That's an interesting point. A lot of laws are based upon the premise that your right to swing your fists ends at my nose. So if what you do to your property adversely affects your neighbors it becomes a similar situation. Seriously, if how you maintained your residence had no impact on anyone else, why would anyone care? So it's not really a matter of individual or constitutional rights. It's a matter of whether individual actions that can affect others are fair game to regulation?
Sure - did you lop 10% off the weight of the car, too?
27 pounds, huh? THAT I could stand to do. Could almost do another 27 after that. Those pounds are sneaky going on. Now have medical reason to attack it so I'd better get at it.
Fantastic...27 lbs in 4 months and gas mileage going up all the time.
Yes I have effectively taken about 1% weight off my car..that should have a measurable effect I would think.
I believe it was 20% - 25% rise in electric bills that caused the Prime Minister of Australia to reject the latest attempt to draw countries into Kyoto.
You are absolutely correct. It is you and I that will suffer in the pocket book over this whole CO2 issue. I think that science needs to have a lot more HONEST debate on CO2 before the politicians are brought in. CA getting involved is totally based on hysteria with little evidence to back up what they are wanting to accomplish.