When I took delivery of the Prius Five on June 16 , it had 121 miles on the odo. The dealer explained it test drives, movement between lots, etc. I did not think too much of it because I would put more than that on it in two days. I know that dealers like to offer test drives on the top of the line models hoping for upselling on the perspective buyers. After playing around with the monthly fuel consumption history display a little, I found the average fuel consumption in May, was 25 MPG, over 106 miles! Looking at the paperwork, the car was built in Japan in April, arrived in Houston in May, spent time in Golf State Toyota (GST) and got state inspection, and tint, done, then I presumed arrived on the dealer lot in Austin sometime in May (GST pre-delivery checklist was dated May 14). This is not a dealer swap, as I purchased from the dealer, it was delivered to. Question is, should I be concerned with the 25 MPG history on the computer? You have to try hard to get that kind of MPG. Do you think some kid at GST / Dealer took it out for joy rides / abuse? Should I be worrried about how these miles were put on, or am I just OCD?
probably a lot of cold starts that completely ruin the mpg's. nothing to worry about. how have you been doing since?
I have almost 500 miles on it now. MFD claims my average is around 49 MPG. Still on the tank dealer provided so no manual verification.
I'd be concerned about the poor fuel economy on a car that had test drives on it as well. When I test drove a Prius, I definitely floored the accelerator to see how much oomph the Atkinson 1.8L/electric motor combo could give, it surprised the salesman sitting in the passenger seat lol. Our Prius had 2 miles on the odometer when delivered...
25 definitely makes you stop and think. That being said cold starts and short trips can bring it down. Down to 25? That's a good question.
Being in Texas and it was used for test drives, I'm sure there was a lot of idling with the A/C on and the salesmen pointing things out about the car.
Yes -- I bet it was just sitting with the power on. It's fine -- driving it hard is not going to hurt it.
Doesn't our book say don't run the motor WOT for the first 500 miles? I know I have not hammered on my car and it has about 400 miles on it as of yesterday. If a rental car can handle thousands of miles of being beat to hell, your Five certianly can handle a short 106 mile thrashing from some idiot lot kid Seriously, the Prius computers will not allow the ICE (gas motor) to be thrashed beyond belief. The max RPM is 5000 something RPM which is nothing for that motor. The electric motors are computer limited for RPM so they are very safe too. As long as there are not too many scuffs on the underside of your new car from the kid jumping the local railroad tracks, you'll be fine Some people will say the best way to break in a new car is to drive it like you stole it Mike
for all you know maybe it was simply left "on" with the ac running for a while. who knows if it was being shown and testdriven... It's probably no big deal.
