I'm in the unfortunate position of owning the least economical Ford Ranger made. It's the 1996 Ford Ranger 4WD Automatic with the 4.0 litre engine. It's touted as getting 17/20 mpg (20-24 mpg Imperial) city/hwy. Until I started making modifications to it, I was never able to get more than 18 mpg out of it regularly, even when using cruise control on the highway. Mine has got a lot of miles, and does get used for my landscaping business, so it's not just a commuter car, but even so, the mpg are pretty horrible. I usually spend about $80-100 per week on gas.

Around my way, Ford advertises the Ranger as getting 29 mpg (35 mpg Imperial) but then in the fine print they tell you that's for the 2WD manual 5 speed with a 4 cyl 2.4 litre engine...not too many of those (none in fact) readily available! They do make a Ford Ranger in Brazil with a diesel engine, that says it gets 35 mpg (42 mpg Imperial), but once again it's not sold here in the good old USA! I saw a website where some guy had got 35 mpg out of a heavily modded 3.4 litre Toyota T100, and I thought if he can do it, why not me?

I began searching for any way to raise my mpg. Some may say ‘Well don’t drive’ which might be the best option but isn’t practical but I have been driving less, combining trips, trying hypermiling techniques etc.. Then one day I read somewhere on the Internet a drop in weight of 100 pounds = approx. 2% improvement in in fuel economy so started removing parts from the Ranger in a effort to strip vehicle weight. Everything in the plastic container weighs in at around 250 lbs., and seems pretty pointless!

The list included…
2x small jump seats from the extended cab (almost useless anyway)
1x bumper extender (also useless)
Heavy fog lamp holders (5 lbs each!)
All the mud flaps
Some useless bits of interior steel
2 interior consoles
The spare tire carrier (I keep the spare behind the seat now)

I could probably drop the weight another 100 lbs by ditching the spare, and another 50-60lbs at least by replacing the alloy rims with the old school steel rims, but I wanted to increase my mpg's strictly without making any real modifications to the vehicle. All the great gas mileage trucks out there on the web are completely impractical...They all have smooth flowing, aerodynamic caps on them, and wheel covers that make any kind of hauling or going off road pretty much impractical. I figured if I was going to do all that I might as well buy a different vehicle.

I can also drop it another 40-80 lbs when necessary by removing the bed liner, and tailgate. However, being a work truck that regularly hauls soil, mulch, stone, rocks, pavers lumber etc...It's tough to get by without those. Built myself a flow through tailgate out of an old shelf, and some wood blocks, and if that is on, with the other stuff removed, and I keep the speed below 50, I find I am getting an average of 21 to 22 mpg (25-27 mpg Imperial) That is a huge improvement over the manufacturer's estimate! I don't honestly see myself getting it up to 30 mpg, but who knows, I'm sure there's more stuff I can remove. I keep thinking about yanking the whole bed, and installing a flatbed instead, but it might be more worthwhile to keep it intact and eventually trade it out for something better on gas. Anyway, drove down to Virginia and back (about 350 miles roundtrip) a couple of weeks ago, and increased by mileage by almost 5 mpg, over what EPA or Ford say a Ranger does. Great!

In the meantime I'm riding my motorbike whenever possible, and hope to trade that out soon for a mid size scooter!

Rich McCann