Colder weather has zapped my mileage to 44mpg

My mileage has dropped from 54 in the summer to 42.5 with the harsh winters we have here in Minnesota, combined with the very hilly city I live in.

BUT... that still beats the pants off the 14mpg I was getting with my old Blazer

 

I totally agree.

I don't try to steer people who wants to buy an Audi to a Prius. Why? I respect the decisions of the Audi owners. They are intelligent humans. They have their reasons. I am not smarter than them and I don't presume to tell Audi owners what to do. It's Toyota's job to convert Audi owners.

The TDI advocates are presumptuous. I wonder if they are Audi agents pushing an agenda.

 

I'll leave all of it alone and keep my quest to the “dark towerâ€.

Priuschat has served me well and may still, but only by looking for specific help via search or private messaging. I thank everyone who helped me with true answers and great advice.

I feel no desire to keep posting any longer and I can’t help it. I know there will be many who will say "go and never come back" or something similar. Please don't waste your time, because I won't be checking this thread anymore unless you feel like making a fool of yourself is needed. This thread the “pusher†for me, i.e. it helped in my quest but it is now dead.

I still have my Prius and will keep collecting data. Don’t know for how long. Please contact me by PM whenever you're interested. The PM is linked to my email address, so I can’t miss it (it is not labeled as span).

I’ll be more than glad to discuss my data or chat about what other elements I found during my quest, but only privately.

Ciao…

 

I'm well aware. I average low to mid 70's mpg in my temperate weather, city driving. The difference in winter results, as I tried to point out, is mostly to do with engine heat management. I would be very surprised if FireEnginner does not block more grill that I do, and also pre-heats with EBH.

The tricks are known; some take more advantage than others.

 

I abandoned attempts to answer questions and provide data when it became apparent there wasn't constructive interest, when responses just redirected focus over to TDI instead.
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Effectively (virtually not actually) 78 miles per gallon for 1500 miles in one month in the dead of winter. Beat that!

I just found out the County reduce my tax by $30 a month because I have a hybrid instead of an ICE car. So I drove 1500 for one month. But saved $30 on gas because of the tax I did not have to pay. It equals to about 78 miles per gallon. Purely back of the envelope/rough calculation.

I expect similar "mileage" in the future.

Laughing all the way to the bank.

 

Whoah there, what do you mean that hyundai reliability is "getting better"? Hyundai reliability has been in the top 3 or 4 for the last 10 years. Beaten by Toyota, and often equalling Honda for second.

Don't you be maligning my beloved Hyundai

I gave away my 10 year old Tiburon last year when I bought my Prius. Engine was still perfect, zero rattles and creaks, Amazing sound system, and some of the most comfortable seats I've ever had. (Kinda crap FE though, averaged around 25-30). In the 10 years I owned it, it was virtually problem free, despite all attempts to screw it up by the incompetent service folks.

I got the Prius because of my love of gadgety goodness, it has better reliability (my only choices there would have been Honda or Toyota), it can double my fuel economy, and the Tiburon is not a good "family car".

I just hope the Toyota service guys aren't as incompetent as the local Hyundai folks were.

 

Wife ran out of gas at 486 miles. She was on her way to the gas station as she usually fills up around 500 miles and ends up with a couple gallons to spare. She ended up getting about 40mpg actual on that tank. This tank even the estimate dropped under 40mpg for a couple hundred miles. Temps have gone above freezing and with a couple longer trips it is back up over 40, but no doubt the Prius still sucks for relative fuel economy in bad winter weather.

 

I think you are looking at this backward. All cars suck for relative fuel economy in bad winter weather. The difference is that most cars *still* suck for relative fuel economy when the weather improves.

Tom

 

Can we get more details:

• What speed when it finally ran out of gas?
• Urban or limited access road?
• What symptoms such as lights or other indications?
• Was she able to proceed on EV to station?

Thanks,
Bob Wilson

 

It was a major 4 lane divided road, she was on a slight uphill incline. Apparently the car stopped after EV was exhausted, presumably <10mph. I don't know what indicators are on or even what should have been on, but she was sure she had plenty of gas left to make it based on previous experience over the last 6 months or so.

I put in the 2 gals of gas in our can and it wouldn't start. We tried shutting it off and turning it on numerous times. I even read the manual to no avail. She called the local Toyota service department who claimed that running out of gas can cause the 12V battery to become depleted, so she would need a tow. That didn't make a lot of sense to me, especially since all the electronics were on, so I figured I'd put in another 2 gallons to make sure there was enough to be pumped to the engine, perhaps due to the incline. It still didn't work initially, but just as we were about to call AAA it suddenly started. I guess it just took a while for the fuel to get pumped around.

Our other cars and vans have sucked about 10% more gas in the winter. The Prius sucks over 20% more, maybe as much as 25% more, so I believe it sucks more, relatively speaking. So does she, and she drives it 90% of the time.

 

I have legally been driving since 1966 when I got my drivers license at 16.

I have had several cars since than and no other car I have owned takes a higher hit during the winter for mpg's than our prius.

This is based on percentages and not mpg so we our comparing apples to apples.

Of course ,in summer weather, MPG's over 50 to near 60 mpg are quite easily to obtain.

alfon

 

You miss my point: It isn't that the Prius does relatively worse in the winter. It's that the other cars do poorly in the summer. If your mileage starts out crappy, there isn't much room to go down. If, on the other hand, your car wrings out a lot of efficiency from a gallon of gasoline, every cold weather loss is going to show.

Tom

 

I got it, it was just a different point than mine;-)

 

I'm not complaining about 40mpg, but it is a big swing from the 55-60mpg which seems to be typical in summer months.

Still wondering what the exact cause/solution is... I might have to buy a Scanguage just so I can try 100% blocking.

 

comment deleted

 

You can say that again!

It's terrible when you think about how much waste takes place then. Think about how much completely unneeded heat is generated.

At least in the winter, you're feeding the cabin with it. In the summer, you run the engine to create cold while at the same time outputing lots of heat... in a traditional vehicle. Prius doesn't, its A/C is electric.
.

 

Actually, it looks like:

• Prius >> other cars :: Summer (Alabama)
• Prius >>> other cars :: Fall (Alabama)
• Prius >>> other cars :: Spring (Alabama)
• Prius >= other cars :: Winter

Bob Wilson

 

YMMV.

I filled up this evening. It was the warmest January week I can remember, hanging around freezing-point the entire time. The result was a calculated average after 445 miles of 48.7 MPG.
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Regarding the TDI and Audi A3 that I read about a few posts back.
Let's put some things straight once and for all.

Audi is promoting since a few weeks on several german magazines it's new (?) TDI 1.6L engine with 99g/km CO2 and 105HP (see attached pic). That's 7%-10% more CO2 (depending on whether you have the 17" wheels or not) and 23% less HPs wrt to the Prius...
Declared fuel consumption is 3,3/4,7/3,8 L/100km (suburban/city/combined) vs the 3,8/4/4 of the Prius. The same or better than the Prius (on paper), unless you drive in town...Certainly diesels will do better than any gas engine, in ideal conditions.
Matching the accessories/trim available on the Prius I got on the online configuration on the audi.de website, to a price of 29151,50€, excluding registration costs (about 100€) and delivery costs (add another 6-700€).
Oh yes, I forgot - this is for the 3 door model only...

If you want a 5 door version, this is what changes.
In this case the CO2 goes up to 102g/km due, likely, to extra weight. The fuel consumption also goes up 0,1L/100km, or to 3,4/4,8/3,9 L/100km.
I matched the configuration to what you get on the Prius in Germany, and you land at a price of 30051,50€.
What you still miss is the head-up display and the alloy wheels. You want alloy wheels on the Audi, similar to the ones on the Prius? you need to dish out 1440€ on top of the prices above (for the base 17" 5 arm model, that is - you want something more fancy in 18"? you can go all the way up to 2000€). These are optional tires, which means you still get to keep, as far as I understood, the 15" steel tires you get standard. So you land at 31491,5€ - vielen Dank.
I expect fuel consumption to raise since the data above from Audi is based in the standard wheels provided. This is not the case of the Prius in which the fuel consumption for the 17" alloy wheels is 3,9/4/4 L/100km.

How much does the Prius cost in Germany with the same features?
28145€ - add 600€ for winter tires (in the Audi calculated as well at 700€) and you get to 28745€. This is still 2746.5€ less than the 5-door Audi.

You might need to still factor in the possible more expensive Insurance (there are many more A3s in Germany and driven by younger (reckless?) drivers than Prius). I have no data on this.

The difference in tax is instead well noteworthy: 36€/year for the Prius till at least 2014, 152€/year for the Audi till 2014 - after that the CO2 limit will have reduced from 120g/km to 95g/km, and therefore the Audi will pay an additional 8€/year (2€ for every extra gram/km above 95), that is 160€/year total - the Prius still 36€/year.

If you drive just a bit more in town, rather than all the time at 90km/h on flat land (find a place in Europe where you can do that, please) - be assured the Audi A3 TDI will cost you way more than the Prius - anywhere you want to look at it. If the fuel consumption is similar or better, the extra buying cost and taxes will likely offset it, if not even be higher. And this if diesel will continue to cost 0,2€ less than gas in Germany as it is now. As soon as the diesel price will match the price of gas, as many in EU predict - it is going to be more expensive maintaining the Audi. You mileage will vary in the US - granted.

And this is *net* of any maintenance costs (surely higher on a diesel, vs hybrid gas like Toyota's HSD) or unexpected out of warranty repairs - I don't want to go into the details of this. Audi is no better or no worse than Toyota. It is not clear, BTW, whether Audi gives 2 or 4 years guarantee - and up to how many kilometres - I could not understand this on their website.

Speaking of less serious topics - the A3 Sportback design is, IMHO, simply ugly (other Audis are instead really nice - so I do not hate Audi design at all) and cargo space is a mere 350 Litres compared to 445liters of the Prius, 0 to 100km/h in 11,4 secs instead of 10,4 secs., 1280kg weight vs 1440kg (yes, the Prius is 200kg heavier, but consumes and pollutes nevertheless less or the same as the Audi!!!). And no silence ever, except when at traffic lights (yes, the Audi has start&stop function).

If this is the answer of Audi to providing a fuel efficient model in Germany, look somewhere else - there are cheaper and better solutions out there.
BTW: the TDI Blue Motion versions of the Golf and of the Polo from VW (same exercise as above), land at about 26385€ and 19005€ respectively. Need to consider that they both don't have alloy wheels and heads up display and provide considerably less room space (yes, the Golf is *cramped* inside!). They do, on paper, consume less than the Prius - 3,4/4,7/3,8 L/100km (for 105HP - same engine as the A3) and 2,9/4/3,3 L/100km (for 75HP...) and emit the following CO2: 99g and 87g respectively. I doubt, though after 7 years of pain and 500€/year average extra repairs with the Polo, that their quality is anything to talk home about.