Can you improve MPG by waxing the truck?

It's worth washing once a month to offset the cost. Waxing would definately lower the drag. I'd guess about 0.5 mpg.

Maybe I'll send that one in to Mythbusters. That would good one for them to test.
They did two cars, one with the windows up and AC on vs windows down, AC off.

AC on won because of less drag..

 

Lot of race teams swear that real slick wax job adds speed. But of course they are talking about 10ths of a second per lap. not a bad idea to keep truck clean. Bears are less likely to rip into you if you are driving clean rig without 6 months of grime and grease on it. Look and act professional and you are a lot more likely to be treated that way.

 

Not on a truck, a boat, plane or race car yes. The best thing about a wax job is when it comes time to sell or trade the trucks paint job will be a big $$ factor! I can't understand how people spend a hundred grand on something and think the spray on crap is called waxing! ROFLMAO! T

The last thing I did before I became disabled was to hand wax a POS Freightliner because red fades badly and even if it was a FL it needed the wax! It was so sad looking! The next morning I'm in the freaking hospital in Victorville, CA! I had to fly back home and that poor truck was absolutely filthy when it got back and I could unload it!

No a wax job on a truck really only does one thing and thats to make you look good and feel proud that you up keep a piece of equipment! And as mentioned above a clean truck keeps DOT away better than a rag arsed POS!

 

It does not help the mileage, but it improves the smile factor.... Take pride in your ride.....

 

I can't imagine it would make any measurable difference on a big truck...there are too many little places that cause drag that offset anything a wax job will do.

I get one really good wax done each year, then the rest of the time get Rainex sprayed on. Yep, I'm a lazy old bag....

 

If you really want to see something that improves mileage, a buddy of mine works for a research company experimenting with sealing the underside of vehicles.

The results they are getting are astonishing. It drastically reduces drag. Think of all the places on the underside of a vehicle that creates an area of "dirty air" and you can understand how this will most likely start to be seen on vehicles in the not so distant future.

The problems are relatively few. They're using plastic panels that can be easily dropped and slid to the side to get out of the way, even on the side of the road.

Also, the looks are almost left totally alone. You can hardly see the panels at all, according to my buddy.

 

I was watching a NASCAR program the other day, and one of the crew chiefs, I can't remember which one, said they experimented with dimpling the car like a golf ball. He claimed it made the car faster, but NASCAR frowned upon the idea.

 

I remember how "rib side" external ribbed trailers seemed hard to pull.

 

Now they just might be onto something here. I'd like to see a real study done on this, with actual figures. I'm talking about a company doing this with part of their fleet, and then looking at the difference. Not some government grant grabbing Joe that is to lazy to have a real job. . .

Hey, I used to have a car like that. Thanks to a late summer hail storm on the eastern plains of Colorado.