Put a canoe on top of my 83.5 Westy and left Ft. Worth for a 230 mi
drive to San Marcos river.  Began speculating what having the canoe on
top would do for milage.

First, I do not advise my ususal milage enhancing method, ie,
following trucks.  The buffeting is much increased, and I do not trust
my crude roof rack and tie downs.

2nd, kept MPH under 70.  But we did have a tail wind which helped.

Hit a nasty rain cell, flooded the interstate, had to drop down to 30
MPH when the hail started.  No damage, whew.

Then crawled thru Austin rush hour, speed from 0 to 20 for most of an
hour.  Temp goes 3/4 up the gauge 'till the high speed fan comes on.

So, all and all, I figure I'm going to get something less than my
usual 18.5 to 19 MPG on a trip like this, 17 would not surprize me.
Surprize!  MPG= 21!!!

Go figure.

On the way home had a fairly stiff crosswind and that reduced MPG down
to 19, still on the high side.  Which got me to wondering; why does a
cross wind seem to rock the Westy more when you are moving down the
road at 65 than when you are sitting still?

Other maybe relavant data:  Running with timing advanced to just
before it becomes hard to start. (10-11 degrees I think) Seems to help
highway performance.  Ran very nicely, even the 'frig stayed lit the
whole trip.  Oh yeah, we had a cold front come thru which meant I
didn't have to use the AC, which probably help by 1 mpg.  And it's an
Automatic.

So, I pleasantly surprized.  Ideas?  Any wind tunnel experts out there?

TBill
83.5 Westy
85 engine (l.9)
for sale
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