MAX AirCon and MPGs. Yeow! Ouch!

Well, I'd sorta breezed past this thread -- until today. I've had the Prius for about three weeks now. The vast majority of the time, I'm lightly loaded (me and my briefcase), and I work hard on the techniques to keep the mpgs up. So far, I'd edged my overall avg mpg up to 48.5, where it seemed to have leveled off.

Today, the whole family took a 50 mile trip in 100 degree heat. My car is black, btw. It was sunny, so the car was "heat soaked" at the outset. With the family aboard (kids ages 17, 13, and 9; with typical weights), we were on "MAX COLD" for about the first half of the trip. Because of traffic and the need to focus on other things, techniques were pretty much out the window.

With all these factors suddenly stacked up against me, I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised, but in this short distance, my avg mpg dropped from an indicated 47.0 (the dealer had the car Friday for some tweaking, and ran me down from 48.5 to 47), all the way down to 38.6!!!. Wow, this car sure can go all over the map with respect to fuel economy! Can't do much about having to load the car up from time to time, but no more MAX COLD for me! :blink:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(jimmyhua @ Jul 3 2006, 07:43 AM) [snapback]280461[/snapback]</div>

I had similar mileage in 93 degree SoCal heat. My mileage was around 30, with 4 adults in the car, and the AC set to 73.

You're getting good advice here. Buy and use a sunshade. Consider tinting. Adjust the AC set point to the highest you can handle.

Mix in a salad once in a while. Stop towing that boat.