Changing rear end?

That is why I stated that one needs to figure out if the running faster, with a corresponding lower mpg, actually makes them more take home money than running slower and keeping more money to begin with. Some operations, it is viable to run faster so you can put on that extra load of grain or whatever. It makes up for the added cost in fuel. But, like I stated, 1 mpg better will generally net a person an extra $10,000 a year in take home money. Now one just has to figure how much they would have to do in extra running at a lower mpg to beat that savings. In most cases, it actually would be a wash. Running faster with lower mpg, more miles, some extra loads, the net might be darn close to the same a someone getting better mpg and running fewer miles, fewer loads. This is why knowing an accurate cost vs revenue vs net is imperative. One has to be a real bean counter to improve their operation. It is a balancing act, for sure.

 

I'm home every day...so it is a considerably different situation as somebody who lives in their truck. There may not be that "extra" load every day...most days there isn't....but getting home an hour earlier means I have an hour of extra daylight to get the lawn mowed or anything else outside around the property. Also, sometimes that extra hour means the difference between sleeping in my own bed at night vs. getting a motel room to take a 10 hour break an hour or so from the house...in which case the money saved on fuel is a moot point.

Like I said, everybody's situation is different.

 

Nothing wrong with that. We all do what we need to to make things all work. If I needed to do things at the house, and went home each night, I might do similar to what you are doing. You are dead on... each situation is different.

Some have argued regarding going, say, 60 mph vs 65 mpg (just throwing those particular numbers out there for discussion), that they make better time at the faster speed, but it is not what you run that counts, but what your average speed actually ends up being. I did a test of my own several years ago, running several weeks at one speed, then another. I found that running something like 55, I ended up averaging around 53 mph. At 60, I averaged around 56-57, and at 65, I averaged around 60. You have to factor in that as the speed goes up, so does the speeding up / slowing down thing for traffic patterns. If you notice from the numbers I mentioned, as the speed I ran went up, the spread between the speed I was trying to run and the actual average got larger as the speed got faster. I have found that I get the best results overall, at least for what I do and where I run, by running about 63 mph. Puts me on the best RPM balance for performance and mpg, while at the same time my average speed stays pretty close to what I am actually running. It is all a balancing act.