It can be surprising to realize all the different factors that can affect gas mileage. Ultimately, the basic point is to help the car’s engine to work as efficiently as possible but there are things that can stand in your way. Autoworks wants you to understand just a few of those issues so that you can take action and avoid them as much as possible.
Buying the Wrong Gas
Almost every car manufacturer includes some information in the owner’s manual about what octane level of gas you should put in your car. It’s tempting to look at that recommendation and go ahead and buy lower levels of gas anyway. That’s more budget-friendly, after all. But what happens is that the lower octane levels don’t give the engine what it needs, and it ends up having to work harder and therefore burns more gas, just to do the bare minimum. You’ll eventually start to notice that engine performance gets worse and worse over time and you’ll hear misfires, which eventually leads to bigger damage.
Avoiding Oil Changes
Everything comes back to oil changes, right? You may not realize just how important oil changes really are to your car’s engine. Engine oil keeps the engine cooler along with the cooling system. It also lubricates engine parts, keeping them moving against each other easily. Another big job that engine oil has is that it removes debris as it circulates through the engine parts. When oil is too old or too broken down to do those jobs, engine performance suffers and you end up getting worse gas mileage. Keep putting off oil changes too long and again, you’re going to risk engine damage.
Skipping Tire and Wheel Maintenance
Another recommended service that gets overlooked way too often is tire and wheel services. These are maintenance services like wheel alignments, wheel balancing, and tire rotations. Why are these so important? These different services make sure that your tires and your wheels are lined up where they should be and properly weighted so that they offer less resistance when the engine goes to move the car. If there’s a lot of resistance from the wheels and tires, that forces the engine to work harder. The engine working harder than it should have to is always going to give you worse gas mileage.
Want to make sure you’ve got all your bases covered so that you get the best possible gas mileage? Autoworks in Kittery, ME can help. Give us a call today and we’ll be happy to take a look for you.