Quote:
Originally Posted by Daox
Welcome to the site.
What kind of mileage are you getting with it now?
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Highway miles, about the best controlled test I've done of it came in at around 41 MPG calculated over a 420 mile stretch, I would guess a 71mph average with the AC on, in other words, 4mpg over the EPA. The main strategy is to lay off the turbo by turning cruise off in the hillier segments of the drive, allowing the car to slow uphill and then regain speed down. Of course that requires a bit of vigilance on the downhill stretches as you can gain speed too fast for other motorists/cops etc. Next time I'll try knocking a few mph off that average, but with the way certain people drive in the summer it's a bit scary to go slow.
City driving, well, we're talking Chicago, so it's a lost cause trying to get a measurement under controlled test conditions. But at least not a lost cause trying to drive better. I have estimated city driving based on short term measurements from the dashboard computer anywhere from the high teens to above 40. It's completely unpredictable; all you can do is time the lights, drive with moderation, leave as much space in front as you dare (not easy in Chicago where everyone cuts in) and hope for the best. What is noteworthy is I had a Prizm 5MT for 12 years -- three hundred pounds less weight, a marginally lower drag coefficient and a manual transmission which I was continually careful to short-shift and never wore out the clutch on -- and this heavy little automatic with a turbo is at least equalling the Prizm's fuel mileage already at only 2000 miles. But I get the sense it is capable of much more.