How many MPG are you getting at 70 mph (GPS)
 

Just a poll to see where everyone is at!
Also to add oem speedo's read 2% fast. So if you're going off an accurate oem speedo 71.4 displayed = 70 actual

Comment what vehicle sub trim and what ambient temp for your vehicle.

Prius 70F 70 mph ~ 46 mpg

Translate to ton-miles. That, at least, provides context.

Payload expressed as tons (percentage thereof) X fuel burn

1,280-lbs payload my pickup
with driver X 20-mpg (@70) = 10 ton/miles per gallon.

150-lb EM’er X 45-mpg (@70) = 3.3 ton/miles per gallon.

When I hitch the trailer (8k), it shoots to over 60 with four passengers also present.

Four persons uncomfortably aboard
an air-conditioned go kart hits a staggering
21 T/M gallon.

Loserville is a town of single person vehicles.
Fuel burn or fuel type just doesn’t matter.

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* 40mpg plus vehicles are the focus

I dunno! I only drive 70 mph a few times a year, when on long (multi-day) trips.

The rest of the year, I toodle along the scenic side roads at ~50 mph / 80 km/h.

But theoretically, an unmodified 5-speed Mirage is good for ~42 MPG US @ 70 mph on level ground in warm weather.

The Metro/Firefly (unmodified) is about the same.

An unimportant context on this particular forum. Perhaps makes sense elsewhere, though.

I recently broke 50mpg at 70 in my Acura TSX swapped Insight on a longer trip. It's hard to know if there wasn't some external factor like a tail wind. MPG at that speed seems pretty variable, I've seen as low as 46, but road conditions in winter are highly variable. I'm willing to bet 50+ in summer will be normal. Could probably break 60+ with P&G.

My other (stock) Insight easily maintains 65-70mpg in winter at 70mph.

I’m not even on your chart but I still enjoy and try to contribute to this site. Been here a long time, I do not own a Metro any longer.

Hmmmm... when was the last time I went 70? On the motorcycle I think.

Amateurs.
I get around 120mpg at 70mph in the summer in the leaf.
To be a little more fair my wife's hybrid sonata gets around 40mpg, during the summer at 70mph.

Ahh, but what's your cost per gallon in the Leaf? And where does it come from?

In Vermont we're paying 17 cents per kwh. It's all from renewables so it's a cleaner option than gasoline, but it puts a "gallon" of electricity at around $5.70, 210% the price of regular gasoline.

Discounting maintenance, that places my 50mph K-Sight at a somewhere between the cost per mile of a Leaf's combined EPA rating and what you're seeing in practice. If you're getting your electricity from coal it's probably cheaper, but I'm betting it's also less clean.

Would I like to own an electric car? Heck yes. But I frequently drive back and forth to Michigan and the infrastructure isn't there yet for me to do it in an EV, and there aren't any cost savings to switching for local driving because I'm already in a pretty efficient vehicle. Plus this car can embarrass a Mustang GT or base Corvette on the drag strip. ;)

You think you can re register that thing as a non hybrid to avoid the ridiculous road tax? One of the states I'm looking at moving to charges $200. Arkansas even has $100 on the Prius. That and I can't even register the ranger at 25 years old as an antique anymore... It has to be 45 years old to be considered! WAT...
2019 has been a horrible year for my taste in vehicles.

With that said I think I'm leaning towards either a 91 Civic Hatch or a 91 CRX for my next vehicle. I already own a 91 civic roller. Needs a lot of work. Can't decide between the civic for extra utility or the CRX because ultra lightweight no aero drag.
I've always wanted a ****box DD I can ding up and not care about, but also get like 50mpg highway at 70, and be fast as **** in gears 1-4. :D
CRX/Civic really fits the bill.

It’s the only way to sort weight carried from the vehicle itself.

Past payload, what’s the reference which matters? Two seats? Two-cylinder?

How does the MPG at 70 matter if there’s no common ground against which to judge?

If it can’t carry ones family + luggage, it’s not a car, it’s a joke fools play on themselves.

May as well ask how long a 650-mile trip takes. A current Mirage holds 9-gals. Refill at 80% at 40-mpg = 290/miles.

Means as I get 1/2 that number, but have 3X the fuel, I’ll roll past and arrive close to an hour ahead.

With a passenger & gear payload that requires 7-8 Mirage.

So, what’s the point of asking about MPG without a reference?

Taking the bus trumps all of them.

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My family is two, and most of the time my car is carrying one. Do I get a bonus for having a small family?

I think perhaps the ultimate metric is total cost of ownership, applied across all vehicles needed to service a group of people. If you need a second car, your cost of ownership increases and it may not be saving you money. Get in a bad accident and get injured and that's a cost too. Die of boredom and that could be an additional cost. Some costs are subjective.

Base rate is 9 cents per kwh, total bill divided by use is usually around 10 to 11 cents per kwh.
NM has the cheapest non hydroelectric power in the nation.
So I pay about 2.5 cents a mile.
The bybrid is more like 5.7 cents per mile assuming I slow down a little and it gets 44mpg.
The infrastructure here didn't exist to drive my old leaf to the next town over and back so I built it.

73mpg at 70mph on I-26 in the summer.

Weirdly, the Smart feels happiest in the 65-75mph rev range. Some quirk of the torque curve and gearing, I guess. Either way, at a disciplined 70 on a flattish motorway, warm weather, favourable traffic conditions, she does about 62-63 MPG imperial.

I never take much notice in the Volvo because Mrs Lemmy drives it too, and efficiency is of little interest to her so the peak figures aren't what they would be if it were driven solely by myself.

about 26mpg at 75mph
about 34MPG at 40-45mph (EVT mode)

that is with a 6.0l engine

Pretty dang good. Would be neat to see that 6.0L hybrid drivetrain in something a little smaller.

This evening our 4×4 yukon denali hybrid (no hybrid aero treatments) was getting about 18mpg at 78mph (mid 20's at 60). But we love it anyway!

What kind of lunatic drives 70mph?

For the most part I don't understand people who go below the speed limit. Its a waste of time more than it is a way to save any significant amount of money.

I do it as a hobby. Plus, sometimes my drive is the only downtime I get during the day.

For me its more of the route I take. 55 mph speed limits. I'm not sure I've ever had my current car up to 70 mph yet. There has been no destination that really requires the interstate yet. I also find the slower speeds less stressful/more enjoyable.

The only one that I know is my motorcycle.
I get ~60 mpg on my 300cc @70.

I cruise at 57. (90km/h) I don't think I've seen 70 in years, even where I speed up for a bottleneck.

Here is my 2 cents worth.

I live and drive in Phoenix AZ. I want good MPG but I do not have the funds to own an electric car.

So I drive a 03 Ford Crown Vic, it is a replacement for the car I drove for ten years. Both of these carswere low cast to buy and to maintain.

I really like this 03 Crown Vic P71 excop car, of all the cars I have owned this is the best yet so I feel I am starting with a very solid reliable basic car.

Why do I much prefer an older car…These cars have a rep for LONG Life, often 100K as a police car, then up to 200/300K MORE as Taxi’s and the stories is what goes bad is the valves and a new set of heads and timing chains and another 200K on the rest of the engine. So 500K+ is not unheard of. The car is easy to repair and fix up, parts are very reasonable and junk yards have a fair number of them so used parts are easy to find.

And I have found other cars less reliable as in:

My wife’s 2000 Toyota Camry, ( seems to get 30/35MPG Highway) and her early 1996 Toyota Wagon (on one trip she made to CA she seemed to get almost 40MPG) and 85 Musa 626 ALL have what I feel is a hidden failure: short life plastics and rubber, I have seen these parts go bad way before the American versions do. And on the 2000 Toyota had some odd electrical problems and a constant fuel vapor problem (some hose has failed0) with a check engine light showing up often.

Our 2002 Ford Explorer is also having odd problems and the PCM is tied into more things like keeping the radio on after you turn of the engine for about 5 minutes or until you open any door. All the door locks lock once you start moving…The antitheft system is freaky..and the rest of the truck is untrustworthy.

This silly truck (Explorer) with a V6 and a 5 speed auto gets worst MPG or as bad as my 93 Chevy full sized G20 350 Van, (14MPG) and Uhual will not rent me ANY trailer even though it came with a factory towing package, as they have ruled it unsafe at any speed with any trailer. I plan on selling it once I get the Van up and running.

Thanks to my 50 year friend Don, who built a junk yard up and fixed cars on the side I was able to follow his problems with so many cars, so I learned about so many nasty unknown hidden problems like Caddy Northstar motors with the started under the intake manifold and how the engine is scrap if it ever over heats…and so MANY others with so many bad designs and nasty failures and problems.

SO I also plan on keeping both the 93 Van and the 03 Crown Vic until I die…which I plan on not doing until 100+. Both just use the PCM to only run the drive train and not control everything.

Now here is what I was able to do: The 2000 Mercury Grand Marques was bought so I could test a few MPG devices, in other posts I have listed the amount of test gear I installed on it so I would NOT be fooled…and I was a careful as I could with all tests. I tested four HHO systems, a Cold vapor system, a throttle body modification…and running her lean.

The 2000 got 27/30MPG at 65MPH, STOCK, this was proven by a drive from Phoenix AZ to Blithe CA. and back on one tank of gas.

It was somewhat retested by a run to Riverside CA from Phx AZ where at 85MPH To the state line she got 25MPG and the from the state line to Riverside at 80MPH she got 26.5MPG. This was with two people aboard, an overnight suit case for two, spare and tools in trunk etc. These run were from gas station to gas station.

When I was able to set her to run lean I tested from 14.7 to 18.0 and found the peek was at 16.4, which gave a reading of pure 65MPH of 35MPG. This was NOT a setting I could use in daily driving, I need a way to fade into the lean setting and back out as need much as did the PCMs in the 85 to 90 Camaro with their TPI systems which was able to get 30/35MPG Highway and could and did in Australia as covered in the 3rd gen Camaro .org site back in the mid 90s.

I am building a special 383 with this system for the van with a planned second overdrive as well. I hope to get into the 20s MPG with this set up in a full sized G20 Chevy Van. I will report what I get when it is broken in and doing road trips.

I also plan on doing what I can to improve my 03’s MPG, I want the best of all worlds, the hot performance the car already has AND great MPG when cruising.

I totally believe I can get both. Again when and IF I have any good news I will report it here.

Granted, it is nowhere near what even near what your chart shows. But as some have said some of these MPG reports are not really everyday car or are costly newer special cars like hybrid’s or full electric cars.

My cars ARE everyday cars and are (for me) LOW cost..the Van cost $3200.00 15/20 years ago, the 2000 was $4000.00 10 years ago with 70K and the Crown Vic $450.00 last year with 185K when bought. It is the best driving car I have ever owned and I am 71 and thus have owned a lot of cars.

Rich

I'll definitely with you there. Poor mpg is 100% okay if there is 0% depreciation and 0% interest. By math a crown vic sub $500 that needs no repairs is about the cheapest vehicle you can drive. Except probably a $500 civic, but those cars aren't as reliable (as a Ford lol).

I get about 50 mpg at 70 mpg at about 80*F with my MPG Modded 2013 CMAX Hybrid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uHoZ5QhVXs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmuw6275PRw

Paul

I have never spent more than $200 pa for combined parts and depreciation for economical, reliable, unfashionable cars.

Well I got it for under $500.00 but did need a fuel pump,(used) and the A/C need a total rebuild, which I did for the cost of parts...and I am fixing her up.

And unlike a little toy car that you will die in if hit by anything even a kid on a bicycle, my car has a very good survival rate.

The idea of a car only weighing as much as its cargo seems insane, you would be riding in a powered cardboard box. Now IF everyone was in the same cars OK but with so many driving big Trucks and BIG RIGs such a car would hardly cause them to feel a bump as they run over you.

Rich

Maybe I'm just not paranoid. I'm 71 now, and nobody has run over my 20 pound bicycle or 200 lb motorcycle. I don't drive like that, and I'm a smaller target, too. I installed 3-point belts in my car when I was 16, always buckled up, and never needed them or worried further. However, for the safety minded, I have sketches of what amounts to a full-body helmet with wheels and motor attached.

I put in standard seat belts in my 56 Studebaker as well in 1964...after I read that it made no sense to have a car crumble up taking the hit only for us to THEN crash into the dash and windshield at that point.

And I too always buckled up...and It saved me a couple of times.

Rich

Ah, the "Highway Arms Race" again. :rolleyes:

I don't care what you are in, if you love the "hit by a semi" scenario, it doesn't matter. I know a man who is virtually a vegetable for life that was hit by a semi... AND HE WAS IN A SEMI.

Of course there is always:

A faster gun

Or someone that will shoot you in the back

Or a faster better fighter

Or a dirtier one

Or a bigger bomb

Or a Nuke

Or a super nova

Or a bigger truck...

IF your number is up....

On the other hand running across a 80MPH loaded freeway in your underwear is not a good idea...driving a strong car can help in most of the accidents you most like to be involved in.

I am 71, and have been a number of them and so far not been hurt in a car, but only when I rode a motor cycle...which I stopped after the third one, NEVER again... I lost the hearing out of my left ear at 16.

That was almost like my bit of underwear and a freeway....

Rich

I'd rather run across the highway in my underwear than be that semi driver that got hit.

This whole "strong car" thing is fallacious. The reason modern cars have crumple zones is twofold: one, the kinetic energy of the car when it hits something is used to deform the car itself, which reduces the energy that can be transferred to the passengers; two, by extending the time from initial impact to when the vehicle stops moving toward whatever it hit, the acceleration (change in velocity per time) is reduced. Since force is the product of mass and acceleration, reducing acceleration reduces the overall force that can act on the occupants. Airbags work on the same principle, extending the time it takes for a passenger's head and torso to go from initial velocity to zero velocity and thus reducing the total force acting on them.

The last thing you want if you're interested in passenger safety is a car that doesn't deform; in that situation there is far more energy transferred to and force acting on the vehicle occupants, who are less replaceable than a car. That's why literally no one builds cars like that any more and one reason why passenger vehicle deaths are down significantly from where they were in the 1970s (11.2 deaths per 100,000 people in 2018 vs. 22.6 deaths per 100,000 people in 1978, per the IIHS).

I can't tell you with my 2010 Prius since I've never driven it over 65 mph but it was getting 56 mpg (no A/C) at that speed. My 1997 Volvo 960 2.9L, 24V, I6, 181HP, on the other hand is a fuel sucking pig. At 70 mpg she'll get 25.5 mpg. If I keep her at 65 mpg the MPG jumps to 28-29 mpg depending on the terrain and temperature.

OK here is something to chew on:

First was this:

This is the official website of the 1959 Opel P-1 Hardtop—the car that shattered the record. If you haven't yet heard the full story, this historic station wagon broke the world record for auto gas mileage in October 1973 with a highly modified engine which allowed the car to travel 376.59 miles on a single gallon of gasoline during a Shell Oil Co. contest at Wood River, IL.

376 MPG | The Story of the 1959 Opel P-1

AND MORE IMPORTANT:

1000 Miles in a Jaguar XJ twin-turbo Diesel car on one tank of gas (18 Gal tank) Top Gear season 12 episode 4 review

Episode Details & Credits
BBC-2 | BBC America | BBC Two | Air Date: November 23, 2008

Starring: Jeremy Clarkson, James May, Richard Hammond


This week's challenge is to drive from Basel in Switzerland, to the north west coast of England. This must be done on just one tank of petrol - no splashing and dashing in France, just one tank. The first to arrive - if any do - gets the honour of switching on Blackpool's illuminations.

So May, Hammond and Clarkson set out on a Eco challenge across Europe. To please the environmentalist they try and get from Basel (Switzerland) to Blackpool in the UK with only one tank of petrol.

This time they didn’t have a tight budget but any production car was allowed. James showed up in a Subaru Legacy Diesel, Jeremy picked a twin-turbo Jaguar XJ and Hammond arrived at the start in a BlueMotion Volkswagen Polo. As far as Top Gear races go this must have been the dullest to date up until the point where the cars are about to run out of fuel with the finish line in sight. Everybody who has ever run out of petrol, and I must admit I have as well, knows that the last few miles give a huge adrenaline rush over wheter or not you will make it to the next petrolstation. You’ll have to see for yourself who won!

OK a dull show: kind of, get this First all three cars make it!! All three cars drove 740 Miles on ONE TANK of gas!!

The BlueMotion Volkswagen Polo is a 3 cylinder diesel and gets 75MPG and has a 10 Gal. Tank.

The Subaru Legacy Diesel was rated for 45MPg and has a 16 Gal Tank.

The twin-turbo Jaguar XJ was rated at 35MPG and has a 18Gal Tank.

Jeremy planed of running out of gas outside London and gong home, so he did not even try to get good gas mileage and drove with the A/C one and fast. YET he made it, 740 miles on one tank.

AND at the end of the show the techs checked how much gas was left in the Jag and reported it could go another 260 miles so the Jag has a range of about 1000 MILES PER TANK.

You can watch it here for $1.99: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TdV...=ELnzHzzT17n6c

My CMAX Hybrid gets about 54-56 mpg at 80*F going 65 mph. MPG's go down with temps going down.:(

Paul