PRIUS GAS MILEAGE SUCKS

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

I am confident that if you drove your pick up truck in the same manner that you drive your Prius your mileage figures were in single digits.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

It's your driving habit most likely.....

My car averages 46-47mpg under my normal driving style yet my buddy can borrow my car and drop the milage to 38-40mpg in no time at all. He also drives his truck and race cars very erratically so if he is driving my car like he does his cars then I can see why. So IMO you may need to rexamine your driving style and entertain the idea of changing it up a little bit. I've driven race cars on the street for 13yrs and I've been able to adapt and I feel much better for it.

You might want to do the math on the gas milage difference between your truck and the Prius and then calculate the actual money spent on gas. You will quickly find that higher mpg numbers can take a big hit but the actual money spent on gas doesn't flucuate nearly as much as it does with vehicles that attain poor mpg numbers like most trucks tend to do when driven the same way.

IE a 1mpg difference (15-16mpg) on a 2007 Dodge Ram truck is similar to a 7mpg difference (46-53mpg) on a 2007 Prius. Make sense? The numbers are not exact but I've done the calcs a bunch of times and the idea is sound.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:48 PM) [snapback]498832[/snapback]</div>

That is about what my 2002 Chevy 1/2ton 2wd std.cab got if I wasn't doing burnouts and drifting corners. So that statement is accurate IMO.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

It depends on the length of the trips, temperature, tire pressure and load. With a 35 mile commute, temps in the 70's, Tires at 42 front 40 rear and not hauling a lot of junk, I average 48-52 with no problem.

 

I do mostly highway driving but occasionally I'll do 20ish miles straight of nearly all city and I keep an eye on it when doing this, to see how it does.

In all cases I'm able to get greater than 50MPG without doing anything special and while at least keeping up (or leading) traffic.

The one thing I don't do is frequent short tips. Those really kill your MPG - if you're doing less than 5 minute trips on a regular basis that might be the problem.

I have about 1300 miles on mine and my first tank was around 55MPG, second was about 51, this tank is about 52 so far - again, that's probably 80% highway.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

Start here http://priuschat.com/New-owner-Want-MPG-he...rst-t15311.html and http://priuschat.com/index.php?autocom=art...rticle&id=3.

Toyota never said you were supposed to get 60 mpg city. They can only legally report the EPA mileage ratings. See http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/fe_test_schedules.shtml and http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/fe_test_schedules.shtml for details on the tests. For the 08 model year and beyond, they added additional tests, hence the new ratings for all vehicles.

As for "The gas mileage for the 2007 Chevrolet 1/2 ton were about 16 miles per gallon. This was with a 4.8L engine with 3.23. gears in a 2 wheel drive." are you stating EPA numbers or what you actually got under similar driving condtions and habits?

BTW, have you looked at http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/cars/bu...s-206/index.htm? One more thing, I have no idea what truck you're talking about, but as a point of comparison, when Consumer Reports reviewed an 07 Silverado 1500 LT 4WD w/5.3L V8, and 4 speed auto, they got 10 city/20 highway, 14 overall (EPA ratings were 16/20) vs. 35 city/50 highway and 44 overall for the Prius.

FWIW, my lifetime mileage so far is ~45.8 mpg.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 06:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

I have my car since last month....... I got 50 MPG From The Dealer to my house on the first day.
The trip was about 35 miles, 25 HWY 10 City.

Since than I have been in the mid 50's.... B)
My best tank so far a bit over 56 MPG. :lol:
I don't know how you are driving to get in the mid 30's.
I still have not even tried the ideas here to get better MPG????

 

Ok, so your truck:

15,000 miles annually / 16mpg x $3.00 per gallon = $2812.50 annual gas bill


Your Prius:

15,000 miles annually /38mpg x $3.00 per gallon = $1184.21 annual gas bill


This is not even taking into consideration how much you save on maintanence for brakes, oil etc. The emissions should be important to you as well but not everyone cares beyond their own personal bubble so I cannot expect anyone to see that as a benefit to the Prius.

If you could somehow pull off the low EPA rating of 46mpg then you would spend $978.26 on your annual fuel bill.

 

I'm thinking driving habits too.

My guess is the AC is being used liberally as well.

Try gliding to stops, easing on the starts and raising your tire pressure a bit. Take all of the extra stuff out of the car you're carrying around "just in case". It's all dead weight. Practice up on the pulse and glide and you could raise it even more.

 

Turn off your AC and then come back and tell us how your MPG is doing.

 

Didn't they raise your interstate speed limits to 80mph last year? Do you spend much time at that kind of speed?

 

for the OP -

what tire pressure are your front tires set to?
how about the back tires?
how long is your average trip?
when you come upon a stop sign or light,
do you run right up to it then hit the brakes firmly?
or take your foot off the gas several hundred meters prior to the stop and coast?
what temp is your a/c set to?
how much stuff are you hauling around in the back?
is the air inlet vent in the back seat for the battery clear or blocked?
do you accelerate from a stop firmly, or very gently like grandma does, or do you floor it?

on my daily commute, mostly highway, 22 miles one way, i'm presently running about 50 mpg

in the city, very short trips to the store, e.g., less than 2-3 miles before shutting down, i run about 40 mpg, sometimes less. going across the street to get groceries, its much less - more like 20mpg for the 1/2 mile round trip to the store.

city traffic, longer trips, 5-10 miles, its more like 44.

so it varies widely, depending on your habits.

its still triple what i got in my jeep

and no one gets the epa rating mileage - my jeep was rated 20, i never got much better than 16-7, and usually closer to 15 ; about 20% lower than the epa rating. drop that 60 rating on the prius 20% and you're looking at 48, which is much more realistic for most of us. e.g., epa ratings are as valid as a politician 'promising' they'll do something for us...

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 06:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

Toyota doesn't say you will get 60, that's the EPA's figure, which all manufactures are required to use. The new figures reflect the EPA's new method of calculating mileage.

Did you calculate this mileage based on miles driven and gas put into the Prius? If so, that won't work. The fuel bladder in the U.S. model introduces variability into the tank volume. You either have to use the figure calculated by the Prius, or do manual calculations over a large number of tanks to reduce the error to an acceptable level.

As other posters have noted, mileage varies a lot based on driving technique and the type of driving. Short trips are hard on mileage. If I do nothing but drive around our little village, my mileage will drop into the 40s. Driving to Traverse City will get summer mileage into the mid 50s. If the engine is warmed up before I stop for gas, I can get 60 mpg on the trip back from Traverse City.

Another poster stated this, but I'm going to say it again in a slightly simplified manner. The mileage on all cars and trucks varies. You don't see as much variation on a big truck since they get crappy mileage all of the time. Also, the difference is larger on a Prius because of the good mileage. A 20% swing at 10 mpg is 2 mpg. A 20% swing at 50 mpg is 10 mpg.

Tom

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 05:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

Interesting. I just met a Prius owner in his upper 60s also and he said he's getting 39 to 41 in his 2006.
Anyway, I live in a hot climate (Livermore, Cali, gets to over 100 summer time), I use the A/C at low fan 78F temp. Fairly flat with some hills here and there and I am getting 50 to 55. My lowest was 48.

It's disappointing to hear the EPA lowered its estimate for the Prius. 45 highway? This is ridiculous! I've never got less than 50 highway. 48 city it's not such a stretch, since at times I do get that low, though rarely.


What could kill your MPG is short trips. When my wife goes to the grocery store, she comes back with HORRIBLE MPG, 39 to 41. She drives normally. I can go on short trips and still get 48 to 50 using certain techniques.

 

I mostly use the car to get to work; 30 miles round-trip, no AC, tires 42/40, generally flat ground, about 25% of the distance on the freeway going ~60mph. I get about 55-60mpg highway and 70-80mpg city for tank averages in the 60-65mpg. The Prius gas mileage is excellent.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(PriusOwner004 @ Aug 19 2007, 04:45 PM) [snapback]498858[/snapback]</div>

Livermore gets a lot hotter than San Jose so that probably helps your mileage. FWIW, my worst "tank" was my 1st one at ~38 mpg (45.1 mpg on the MFD). My trips aren't short (28-32 mins typically to work, ~20 mins of it highway) and I can only manage tanks above 50 mpg if I try really hard to keep it below 70 mph on the highway.

On my commute which is mostly on highway 85, you'll get passed constantly if you go 70 mph, even though the limit is 65.

From what I've observed on here, it seems that 04 (and maybe 05) owners are able to achieve better mileage than those w/06+ Priuses.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 03:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

Sounds to me like he op is basing his mpg on a single tank manual calculation. I wonder what the mfd reported for that tank mpg. I believe it is normally accepted that the mpg readout is on the order of 1.5 to 2 percent high whereas fillup to fillup can easily have a variance of several gallons which can be on the order of 20% or more.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(westex39 @ Aug 19 2007, 06:39 PM) [snapback]498829[/snapback]</div>

I get between 65 and 85 MPG in the city.