Gas Saving Tips That Would Make Your Mom Proud

• Table of Contents
• 1. Starting and stopping in heavy traffic
• 2. Braking hard at a red light
• 3. Too much junk in the trunk
• 4. Gunning it when it turns green
• 5. Under-inflating your tires
• 6. Neglecting maintenance

1. Starting and stopping in heavy traffic

Let’s be honest, one of the reasons why you’re on two wheels is likely because you didn’t want to be stuck in traffic. No one likes traffic, of course, but if you’re currently living in one of the states that doesn’t allow lane-splitting, sometimes you’re just stuck in traffic, and that sucks. It hurts your gas mileage too. Motorcycles generally have great gas mileage BUT being stuck behind a mom in her minivan will really affect that. Often times, shifting your work schedule an hour forward or backwards may lessen the amount of time you spend in traffic. I can tell you from experience that working the 9-5 meant that my 10 mile ride to work was often a 30+ minute ordeal. However, changing my shift to 8-4 instead meant that I was no longer in traffic for the majority of ride and my 30 minute commute was now a 15 minute commute. It’s the starting and stopping that really affects your mileage because you’re creating energy when you get going and immediately losing it when you have to slow down just 20 feet down the road. Do this a couple of hundred times on your commute to and from work and you’ll really see the difference at the pump.

2. Braking hard at a red light

This is pretty much taking the starting and stopping to and extreme because you’re drastically cutting your speed…which you really shouldn’t be doing on a motorcycle anyway. Not only is it dangerous but you’ll be hurting your MPG as well. If you’re a safe rider, you should already be looking far ahead and shouldn’t have to do this. If you’re looking ahead, you should be able to see that you’re likely going to have to stop, allowing you to coast or start breaking early, saving you on gas and brakes.

3. Too much junk in the trunk

Of course, motorcycles don’t have trunks but you know what we mean. If you carry saddlebags, and we hope you do, there’s no point on keeping them on if they’re constantly empty. The same can be said about keeping them constantly full. That is why we created our quick disconnect system that allows you to put on the saddlebags when you need them and take them off when you don’t, all in a matter of seconds. Yes, you can put your bags on and take them off within seconds. The same goes for sissy bar bags or any kind of luggage. Like we said, constantly keeping your bags full of different things you don’t often need is not good either. Keeping a week’s worth of clothes, after your week-long trip has finished is probably not a good idea. A basic tool kit and rain gear is probably all you need on a daily basis. What do you carry on a daily basis?

4. Gunning it when it turns green

We’ve all been guilty of doing this at least once or twice…this week. There’s nothing like taking off from a dead stop and hitting full speed (limit) within seconds. Unfortunately, this really takes a lot of energy for your motorcycle to do and that burns more gas than you want to. Yes, taking 15 seconds to hit the speed limit is probably the most fun thing to do either, but it sure will save your gas mileage.

5. Under-inflating your tires

Even though everyone knows this, you’d be surprised how many riders don’t have properly inflated tires. It should be on your riding check list before you hop on, yet we’re surprised at how many tires aren’t properly inflated. By having low tire pressure, the tire begins to look flat. This, in turn, allows more of the rubber to make contact with the pavement, which means there is more resistance, which takes more energy to move the tires and so on. So you’re really just burning more gas by not properly inflating your tires. A decent air gauge will be able to tell you your tire’s air pressure within seconds and it’s really not a hard thing to do. We recommend you checking your tire’s air pressure at least weekly if you don’t ride often or before every ride if you do. Also, if the weather changes drastically since you last checked your air pressure, check again.

6. Neglecting maintenance

If we really have to tell you to do maintenance on your bike, you shouldn’t be riding. So let’s just assume this is not meant for you but for your friend. Basic oil changes should be done regularly along with checking all of your other fluids. That being said, how often you should change your oil is a whole other subject we will tackle in another blog post.

Most of these “tips” aren’t really critically acclaimed news, right? We kind of already knew all of these. And most of these are really more about being efficient with your riding habits. The more efficient you are with your riding habits, the more efficient your motorcycle will be and that’s great because you want to ride your motorcycle as long as possible, don’t you? Need more fuel saving tips? Check out an earlier blog post we did a few years ago. Similar things apply.