'96 SL 42 MPG City!!

I just read an article in Popular Science (or Mechanics) about a
guy that is the champ of wringing mileage out of cars with careful
driving. I applied some of his techniques for about half of my last
tank and got 41.8 MPG driving back and forth to work. All city, bad
stop and go on the way home. I usually average 36 MPG with my '96 SL.

I might get real serious for a whole tank and see what I can get it up
to.

 

what issue ws it in?

 

No surprise to me -- I get that kind of mileage (40+ mpg) routinely during the summer in my '99 SL with manual
transaxle and no AC but that's about 60% highway 40% city.

 

No surprise to me -- I get that kind of mileage (40+ mpg) routinely during the summer in my '99 SL with manual
transaxle and no AC but that's about 60% highway 40% city.

 

Come to think of it, I think it was Reader's Digest last month.
Sorry, I get so many periodicals........................

 

It wasn't that, anyway -- just read the RD article last night, no mention of
Saturns.

 

The RD article did not mention Saturns, but told about the guy's
driving techniques to get better mileage. I think they were driving
hybrids to get 150+ MPG. But you can apply gentle acceleration,
timing lights and coasting to any car. I'm not going to the extreme
he did, but if I can get 5mpg more by slowing down a bit and driving
more smoothly, I'll give it a try.

 

Well, it is feasible in a base S. Wish they still made these, it's an
excellent time for a comeback. We had a '96 base S, roll up windows and
stick and averaged 35-40 mpg in the city. Just drive like a grandma, it's
easy. I average 33mpg on my stick ION.3 country driving, nno longer live in
the city, but would imagine it gets 25-30 in city.

 

I should hope so -- I'm getting 27+ in city driving in a 99 SL2 with automatic
transmission.

 

My best was when I cleaned my throttle body and opened my spark plug
gap to .50