Well, I was reading the February 2004 article on the Prius at Car And Driver again and noted something important. While, we may all complain at C/D's rather poor fuel mileage, in relative terms, the Prius did quite well. "Many of us tried to drive the Prius like committed Greens. Other less patient colleagues hammered down. Our combined results: 1338 miles per 31.832 gallons, or 42.03 mpg. That’s well up on the 35 mpg we managed from our last Prius, and it puts this one in fifth place in the C/D-Observed Fuel-Economy Hall of Fame, behind a 2002 Honda Insight hybrid (48), a 2000 Insight (47), a 1992 Suzuki Swift (45), and a 1998 VW Jetta TDI (43). That’s still impressive, considering the Prius is bigger than all the above and that the Jetta was driven from coast to coast on the superslab." So, aside from the fact the TDI was driven on the highway, the Prius performs quite well.
"... other less patient colleagues hammered down." . That about sums up how well they actually thought about what they were doing in terms of mileage tests. Blundering idiots... . _H*
I can't understand. I have easily gotten 45.9mpg driving like a crazy bastard. In fact I've never gone under 48 even on my 1st tank. OK, OK, 47.8mpg.
I should write up a summery of the trip, but I just drove from Denver to Chicago and back. On the return trip I faced the absolute worst cast scenerio for mileage: 30 degree temps 60mph (yes really) crosswinds with blowing snow (lots of trucks blown off the road) Steady 75MPH driving The elevation climb from 700 ft to 5300 ft E10 fuel sold in Nebraska and Iowa With all that against me, I got the worst mileage ever in my Prius with an average of around 38 mpg. I usually get around 48 at home. I guess the point is that it's really possible to get mileage as low as the high 30's in a Prius without being an idiot or trying to make the car look bad. The car's mileage is pretty sensitive to driving style and conditions. You can't change physics.
I agree that it is quite possible to see low mileage. I've noticed that now that the weather is getting colder and the gasoline mix has been changed, instead of getting between 48 and 51 mpg, I'm seeing more like 43 to 45 mpg. Interestingly, I'm finding that I get my best mileage on the highway. I have a 40 mile each way commute which is virtually all highway miles. A colleague and I went to lunch today and I show 44.4 mpg as an average on this tank. Although it is shocking to see that, it is still pretty darn good. The best I've seen is 57 mpg, again on a highway trip where I was averaging 65 mph. Definitely drops a bit if you go above 65 mph... B)
My lifetime average is 51.7mpg UK (=43.1mpg US); my last tank was 42.9mpg UK (=35.8mpg US), and I think the current one is going to be worse. I believe I drive pretty carefully, but my normal commute is fairly short. I think in real life you generally shouldn't necessarily expect more than 55mpg UK (45mpg US) unless you do a lot of motorway/highway driving or have a long commute.
All depends on the average speed too. This summer I had to drive through 50km of construction at 70 km/h, so I reset the MFD to see what the car would average at 70 km/h. Try 3.8 l/100km or 74 MPG Imperial gallon. Conditions were flat, no wind, no A/C, and no cruise control. So under certain conditions it is entirely possible to get superb fuel economy.
I think people who don't own Prii don't do a good job driving them, this is most likely true of any car but it shows up more with a Prius because the numbers are higher. You should be able to decrease the mileage of most cars by 20% through agressive driving and this might be around 4 or 5 mpg in a 7 series BMW, but in a Prius it could be 10mpg or more. The magazine testers simply have no desire to get good milage; their whole focus is on performance. Plus Car and Driver almost certainly had the tire pressures set at the manufacturers recommendation, if they bothered to check them at all. Consumer Reports got 44 which is in the same ball park as C/D and R/T.
This is "Road and Track†folks of course they drive fast and corner hard that is what it is all about. Car and Driver are no better, same church different pew. I would bet the even the people that "drove like greenies" did not come close to even the average Prius driver around here let alone the hyper milers. It’s a dirty job but someone has to do it.
I only have a short 4 km stretch of motorway that leads into the university. The rest of the 15km trip to school is on surface streets. Over the summer, I'm averaging 4.5L/100km (about 62mpg UK). Hmm, some of you are still thinking in absolute terms lol. We've already been over the argument that their mileage is horrible. But what I was trying to point out here, is that given that they've driven all their vehicles this way, The Prius is still at the top 5 (3 if you count the Insight as one for the two years and the TDI as highway only).
