Partisan Politics on the internet...

FINALLY!!! THE VOICE OF REASON

Gard

OH TAY! Back to the truckers... Have they, did they, are they going to strike. If so, then they need to all do it at the same time. If each individual is going to go on their own strike.... "Like I'm not going to run my truck today, but I'll run the rest of the week", then it will not have any effect. It won't be any different than the truck being out of service for repairs. One tuck off the road at the time won't make any difference but when they ALL shut down for days at the time... Only then will they draw some attention! Good or bad, it will draw some attention.

I drove 1100 miles round trip last weekend to a show in Jacksonville, Fl. I carried four horses, Jennifer showed in the same classes as we have in the past several years. except two of the four horses are our two year old babies that are just starting out. Most of the people there were from N.C. These are the same people we show with/against here at home, in N.C. also in Pa., Tn., S.C., Va., etc. The same people, same horses, just a different facility and different judges. It's begining to seem like the movie Ground Hog Day! I can look at a class line up before they enter the ring, pick the top winners in the class and get 8 of the 10 right almost every time.

  I guess what I'm saying is.... I could have stayed at home, saved $400.00+ in GASOLINE. Took the $400.00 gas money and bought some nice trophies, an assortment of blue and championship ribbons. Used the entry fee money, stall money (5 stalls), camper spot money, shavings money, DQP money, picture money to the photographer, etc. and made a down payment on the F-450 I looked at with the POS 6.0 diesel engine that would konk out on me with a load of horses going to a show over in Tennessee this summer while traveling through the mountains while it's 101 degrees....I guess... I'm not doing my part to save fuel. Each show is a repeat of the last, everything just keeps going round and round.... cept' for the fuel prices, and the hay, and feed, and vet calls, which keep going UP.

I think the price of this fuel is just catching up with everything else. I bought a new K20 Silverado 4x4 in 1978..paid $8100.00 cash. The next year I bought a 30' long 7' wide 7' tall, steel Circle M Supreme stock trailer, paid about $5000.00 for that. So I got $13100.00 in a new truck and trailer that will haul half the horses in the "Bend of the River" community. I got about 7 times that much money tied up in the rig I have now. Gas in 1978 was what??? .50 a gallon, this morning it's $3.25. .50 a gallon X 7 = $3.50 a gallon!! So, gasoline hasn't gone up as much as vehicles have in the past 30 years... But it's almost there, at least it is in Nash County!

  Man Da#n, hard to believe that was 30 years ago!!! I don't think I'll see another 30 years, I'll be hitting the 50 mark in September.

  How about some breakfast?!!

The so called trucker strike was/is just to get a little publicity to the high cost of diesel. We all sit here in front of our expensive computers that we have to pay a monthly fee to be on line, talking about our expensive trailers, that require expensive trucks to pull, talking about showing, rodeoing or trail riding all of the above takes even more cash to participate in, yet we are all going to stop over an extra $50 in fuel. If you were down to your last $50 I would hope you were not going to the rodeo, show, or trail ride to begin with.

And by the way, if you don't have the stomach for a little razing by the members on here, then go somewhere that thinks you are always right. I still think this is an opinion forum, none of us are experts, and if you go spouting off something that is dead wrong your most likely going to get called out on it.

It happened, April 1st

Gard

Steve, I'm confused.  You remind us this is an opinion forum and that none of us are experts, but you warn others if they spout off about something that is wrong they will be "called out on it".  On whose basis is something wrong, and if it's someone's opinion, why can't they share it here without being called out on it by you?

Boy, I sure miss the old days when we all drove 454's or 460's and complaind about the 5 mpg. Let's see...a little calculation...25 years ago...GAS...$1.25 gallon...5 mpg...30 gallons...150 miles for $37.50.  A little more calculation...today in Oklahoma...DIESEL...$3.70 gallon...12 mpg (have my foot in it)...30 gallons...360 miles for $111.  That means it is costing me 6 cents more per mile than it did 25 years ago. I am not going to complain about it.

Now $4 per gallon milk...kids...3 gallons per week. Or bottled water is all that we can drink now...89 centsper bottle...$7.12 per gallon...I think...calculator quit working

Get a couple of your friends to each kick in $50, and you could have one grand BBQ.

I got to wonder how much fuel this country would save if the 55 mph speed limit was reinstated. I know my truck gets somewhat better mileage running 55 that it does running 65-70. My truck gets almost 1 mpg better running at 65 rather than 70, when weighing approx. 23000#.

I was getting right at 8.0 running 70 and almost 9.0 running between 63-65 on flat ground, coming up from Florida into North Carolina.

1100 miles divided by 8 mpg = 137.5 gallons x $3.25 = $446.87 for gas

1100 miles divided by 9 mpg = 122.2 gallons x $3.25 = $397.22 for gas

That's almost a $50.00 savings for one show by slowing down by 5 to 8 mph. But it's hard to do, because you feel like you're about to get run over buy everyone that's in 900 hurries to get somewhere.

So there's that $50.00 that HWBar was speaking of. All I got to do is slow down and I'll be $50.00 to the good!!

That is right. I know my tahoe gets alot better mileage running 55-60 versus 75-80. But at 55 I feel like this .

You know you are right about this, I'm no expert on elves, or eels, or Elvis, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn 3 weeks ago.

Speeding on the highway adds a surprising amount to your fuel costs.

With gas prices rising, gas-saving advice abounds: Drive more gently, don't carry extra stuff in your trunk, combine your shopping trips.

This is all sound advice but there's one driving tip that will probably save you more gas than all the others, especially if you spend a lot of time on the highway: Slow down.

In a typical family sedan, every 10 miles per hour you drive over 60 is like the price of gasoline going up about 54 cents a gallon. That figure will be even higher for less fuel-efficient vehicles that go fewer miles on a gallon to start with.

The reason is as clear as the air around you.

When cruising on the highway, your car will be in its highest gear with the engine humming along at relatively low rpm's. All your car needs to do is maintain its speed by overcoming the combined friction of its own moving parts, the tires on the road surface and, most of all, the air flowing around, over and under it.

Pushing air around actually takes up about 40% of a car's energy at highway speeds, according to Roger Clark, a fuel economy engineer for General Motors.

Traveling faster makes the job even harder. More air builds up in front of the vehicle, and the low pressure "hole" trailing behind gets bigger, too. Together, these create an increasing suction that tends to pull back harder and harder the faster you drive. The increase is actually exponential, meaning wind resistance rises much more steeply between 70 and 80 mph than it does between 50 and 60.

Every 10 mph faster reduces fuel economy by about 4 mpg, a figure that remains fairly constant regardless of vehicle size, Clark said. (It might seem that a larger vehicle, with more aerodynamic drag, would see more of an impact. But larger vehicles also tend to have larger, more powerful engines that can more easily cope with the added load.)

That's where that 54 cents a gallon estimate comes from. If a car gets 28 mpg at 65 mph, driving it at 75 would drop that to 24 mpg. Fuel costs over 100 miles, for example - estimated at $3.25 a gallon - would increase by $1.93, or the cost of an additional 0.6 gallons of gas. That would be like paying 54 cents a gallon more for each of the 3.6 gallons used at 65 mph. That per-gallon price difference remains constant over any distance.

Engineers at Consumer Reports magazine tested this theory by driving a Toyota Camry sedan and a Mercury Mountaineer SUV at various set cruising speeds on a stretch of flat highway. Driving the Camry at 75 mph instead of 65 dropped fuel economy from 35 mpg to 30. For the Mountaineer, fuel economy dropped from 21 to 18.

Over the course of a 400-mile road trip, the Camry driver would spend about $6.19 more on gas at the higher speed and Mountaineer driver would spend an extra $10.32.

Driving even slower, say 55 mph, could save slightly more gas. In fact, the old national 55 mph speed limit, instituted in 1974, was a response to the period's energy crisis.

It was about more than just high gas prices, though. The crisis of the time involved literal gasoline shortages due to an international embargo. Gas stations were sometimes left with none to sell, and gas sales had to be rationed. The crisis passed, but the national 55 mph speed limit stayed on the books until the law was loosened in the 1980s. It was finally dropped altogether in 1995. (The law stuck around more because of an apparent safety benefit than for fuel saving.)

Despite today's high gas prices, don't expect to see a return to the national 55 mph speed limit. The law was unpopular in its day, and higher speeds have become so institutionalized that even the Environmental Protection Agency's fuel economy test cycle now includes speeds of up to 80 mph.

Driving 10 miles per hour faster, assuming you don't lose time getting pulled over for a speeding ticket, does have the advantage of getting you to your destination 50 minutes sooner on that 400 mile trip. Whether that time difference is worth the added cost and risk is, ultimately, up to you.

One of the nice things about posting on a forum is that you aren't graded on your msippellings or yer grammir. 

Some may make judgements about you for a msippelling, but I've found respectful people won't bring it to everyone's attention in public.

This is a private forum (not a club) for those that need knowledge about horse trailers and hauling and we want first timers to post.  We need old timers with experience and knowledge to answer.  BUT, If you feel your longevity is protection for you to take ownership of what people should tolerate on "your" board please help us out with a reevaluation of your purpose and importance to this forum.