Hypermiling the Camry Hybrid

I replaced a 2005 Civic Hybrid (manual transmission) with a 2018 Camry Hybrid. The hypermiling experience is quite different between the two.

With the Civic the most effective of all the tricks was the FAS or Forced Auto Stop. The Civic would only automatically cut the engine at slow speeds so there were dividends to be paid for manually killing the engine at higher speeds and coasting. Unfortunately this was a bit dangerous as the computer was off for a few seconds. The AC would not work with the engine off so using AC took a big chunk out of the mileage. The upside was wonderful gas mileage if one was willing to be uncomfortable and live with the danger. The high speed engine cut off was not accounted for in the EPA rating so there were times I could nearly double the EPA rating.

The Camry automatically kills the engine itself with no need to manually interfere. The great thing about this is that the AC still works even with the ICE off and the car is 100% safe all the time. The bad thing is that this behavior is already accounted for in the EPA rating so there is not nearly the headroom the Civic had, not nearly as much to be gained with special techniques. Better mileage can be achieved with the AC off but even with the AC on good numbers are still possible. This is perhaps the most wonderful thing about the vehicle, that good mileage and comfort can both be had at the same time.

I was looking forward to using 2x techniques that I believe were called gliding and happy mode. Gliding is easy, I just pop the stick in neutral and that is that. Happy mode is impossible on the 2018 Camry. The idea is to neither charge or discharge the battery but this is a moving knife edge that is impossible to balance on. I usually go for gentle battery charging rather than gentle boost.