2009 Prius Base - $19k

[Matt Herring]

Originally Posted by PaleMelanesian

That avatar - did you take the picture? It tells 1,000 words, at least!

I stole/borrowed it from a guy over at priuschat.com so I can't take credit for it...but it is a doozy of a picture! As soon as I saw it I added it as my avatar. He photoshopped the back seat of a prius with the front grill of a truck...it's not an original photo

[Matt Herring]

Almost fill-up time and this latest commute to work (plus a side stop at the bank) got me up to 63.4 mpg over 405 miles (see pic). This was in steady traffic, 35 mph, alot of EV mode.

I'm thinking about changing to this route to go to work because it has alot of stop lights and is 40 mph or less most of the way (this works to my advantage to stay in EV mode instead of driving above 40 mph on my old route) and is alot of downhill (from the point where I usually turn off to use my old route). For the ride home, I might keep my old route as it is less uphill than the new route would be. The new route is about the same distance traveled as the old route (only adds about a mile) but heavier traffic would add a few minutes to my drive.

It's hard to argue with the results after driving it the other day...3 bars of 100+ mpg and 2 bars at/over 75 mpg...verrrrrrrry interesting.

I'm at 63.2 mpg over 430 miles with a fill-up due today or tomorrow.

[Matt Herring]

In addition to trying to move up the ladder on SVO's ecomodder Top mpg list I'm also trying to track a guy down on myhybridcar.com Hopefully my new route to work will push me past him. I'm second on the list over there for Prius and need to get to over 58 mpg to catch him.

Toyota Prius - Hybrid Fuel Economy Data

[NeilBlanchard]

Eeeggsellent! [/Mr. Burns voice]

You got me lusting after an iQ or an Insight -- or the new Prius!

[Matt Herring]

New Route Day #1: Just ok for me. My MFD held steady at 63.4 mpg so that's about what I got on the route today in terms of mpg.

It was unusually cool this morning (51 degrees when I left the house) so my first 5 minutes were well below my avg. morning. I also didn't luck out on a couple of the stop lights so I was forced to come to a complete stop and heavier traffic behind me forced me into ICE on acceleration (I could have drove the people behind me nuts and accelerated in EV mode but I opted for kindness). Additional drive time was 5 minutes compared to my old route.

All in all...not bad results as my mpg didn't get any worse by driving the new route (just an extra mile on the odometer). I suspect this new route will be better for mpg...how much is yet to be determined.

Planning to fill up the buggy on the way home as I dropped down to 2 Pips remaining on my commute to work today. 450 miles so far this tank and 63.4 mpg not counting my drive from work to the gas station on my way home from work. Pretty good results this tank...will post official results after the fill-up.

FYI - The 2010 Prius are in the hands of several drivers on priuschat.com and all seem to be pleased with their purchase. A few drivers over there are reporting nice mpg numbers (55 mpg out of the box without any hypermiling efforts). 70 mpg looks possible in the 2010 in the hands of a skilled driver.

Also, another 2009 Prius joined ecomodder on Sunday...nice...hope he's active in the forum so we can bounce ideas off each other...

"Green Manalishi sthac 2009 Toyota Prius Touring Sun. May. 10/09"

[Matt Herring]

Filled up on my way home from work today:

My best mpg thus far...61.94 mpg (63.2 mpg on the MFD)! My lifetime mpg is now up to 56.2 mpg and climbing! Still get the big grin when filling up the tank for under $18 and driving 450+ miles on it. Checked the tires after filling up and they were still at 44/42 so I bumped 'em up to 46/44 (oooooh).

My next tank I'll be experimenting with the new route to work and may be pulling the grill block depending on what temps we see over the next couple weeks. Ill pull it if we start seeing consistent 75+ degree days but rain and low 70's is predicted so it's still in place for now.

Keep 'em crossed...gunning for another record tank!

[Daox]

Very nice Matt. Sounds like you're really starting to get the driving technique down pat.

[Matt Herring]

A full week of commutes on the new route to work and a few bits of info gathered...

The first 6 miles of my commute to work is the same highway whether I use the new route or the old route. Where the route splits there is about 5 miles left to drive on the old route and about 6 miles to drive on the new route.

I have found that the new route gives me a better opportunity to get higher mpgs but the increased traffic on that route often negates the opportunity to capture the available mpgs (traffic lights are always red when I hit them because of their short green light stage and rarely can I coast through them vs. stopping at them or increased traffic forces me to interrupt coasts).

At the point the two routes split I was able to gain about 1.5 mpg from that point on the new route. On the old route I was able to gain about 2.5 mpg from that point (when I say "gain mpg" I mean on my SGII from the reading at the time of the split).

There has been alot, and I mean alot, of rain this week so my new route experiment probably needs another full week to verify if it's worth it. If I had to choose right now I'd stay with the old route as their is less traffic and more flexibility in my driving.

After 175 miles on this tank I'm at 61.5 mpg on my MFD (down 1.6 mpg from my best tank ever at the same mileage). I've had to drive on the highway alot more than usual on this tank (approx. 75 of the 175 miles...usually 25 of the 175 miles) so my mpg is feeling the effect of that. I have about 300 miles to get back to 63-64 mpg on the MFD...hopefully it will be all non-highway driving.

[Daox]

Whats the difference in distance between the two?

[Matt Herring]

Originally Posted by Daox

Whats the difference in distance between the two?

The old route is 11.0 miles...the new route is 12.1 miles (the split between the old route and new route occurs after 6 miles leaving 5 miles on the old route and 6.1 miles on the new route).

My results this week are telling me with the additional 1 mile of driving on the new route and the results I saw over the week that the old route will produce better results in the long run (my great mpg run on the new route earlier in the week could have been a perfect storm of good traffic patterns/good driving/good weather). The weather this week didn't really give the new route a fair shake so I'm giving it another 3-4 commutes to give it a fair shot.