Mileage increasing tricks

Since cars get worse mileage on ethanol than straight up gas, I've been trying to implement little tricks to improve my mileage and offset the ethanol mileage hit.

For example, pumping up the tires to their rated limit (35 psi) using the cruise as much as possible (even on Indianapolis Blvd!), and keeping it at 65 mph on the highway.

I learned a new trick. My car has one of those "manumatics". It's an automatic, but you can shift it yourself if you want. You pull the stick towards you, and shift up by pushing it forward and pull back to downshift.

I recently learned that when it is in manumatic, the torque converted is locked in gears 3, 4, and 5.

If you drive on the highway in 5th gear, the torque converter doesn't lock and unlock like it does in D. Saabistas report as much as a 1 mpg improvement in highway mileage by driving in 5th gear rather than "D".

I started doing that today. We'll see if I can see any improvement.

Every little bit helps. If I can minimize the mileage penalty of mixing E85 with regular gas, the cost savings is over $6 a tank.