New Car for ME!!!
 

So, due to issues with the Lumina, I've been rather lax in updating my logs here. That, coupled with life, has kept me away mostly all the time for a while. I've still been tracking; just not updating.

I'm here again to say that happily, most of that is all behind me.

On Friday, 2/5/10, my wife and I pulled the trigger on a new car to replace the Lumina.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4046/...91a195cf01.jpg

It's a bad photo (from the first snowstorm), but it's what I have at the moment. 2004 Hyundai Elantra GLS, automatic transmission. When they handed over the keys it had 94913.4 miles on the clock.

It has a few things it needs, and some things I want for it; so here's the laundry list:

• Oil change
• Air filter change
• Cabin air filter change
• ATF change
• New plugs/wires
• Exhaust leak at resonator
• Rear tires replaced ASAP

Got the oil change and air filter done yesterday; I hope to get the exhaust leak done tonight. After that, tires next week, and so on when time and money permit after that.

949,013 miles?? Almost a million?

I'm encouraged. I just got home w/ a 2004 Accent GL w/ 59,591 miles.

Wow, at 949,013 miles, make sure you change the timing belt. They seldom go over a million. ;-)

Haha, no, sorry. Fixed.

So, I haven't updated the thread here, but my log has been going. I got my Goodyear Assurance FuelMax tires put on 2 days ago; 60.7 miles into the tank. They seem to be WORSE ever so slightly in cold temperatures; my drive to work has been 31-32 MPG instead of 32-33. No big deal, could just be the increase in diameter.

The drive home, in warm temps, has seen MAJOR improvements. SGII reporting 44 MPG average for the trip, instead of the usual 35-37. Very, VERY quiet tires.

Only had to buy two, the others were fine. Looked them up, Uniroyal Tiger Paw Touring seems to come in at Crr of 0.00704 - not the greatest in the world, but still LRR - thank you previous owners, and you probably didn't even know it!

I used some LDPE foam packaging that I had at work and cut pieces to fit in as an upper grille block too this morning. It definitely helped the warmup; was at optimum operation about a mile before it normally gets there.

Nevyn-
I also just bought tires for my Elantra (see my sig)!

Question: is the Scangauge II more accurate than the built-in fuel economy reading on the Elantra? Or are they both showing the same data? I don't have much experience with either gauge so before I do any formal testing I want to know what the numbers mean.

I hate to disappoint, but I can't answer that for you. Mine doesn't have the upgrade (if it was even available on the base GLS) that gave 'em the computer. I'd like to think that they 'd be CLOSE as far as average, trip, and instant MPG go. Being able to monitor beyond that for things like air temp, water temp, ignition, throttle position, load, and others, as well as read/clear "check engine" codes is what prompted me to go the SG route.

What numbers do you want to know the meaning of?

I believe that this vehicle shows the "trip mpg". When I hold down the mode button for 3 secs it zeroes out the trip counter if i am on that. If I am looking at mpg it zeroes out the reading and starts showing trip mpg after I have driven a mile or so.

I can tell if my driving is increase or decreasing the "trip mpg" in real time so this works well for the first 50 miles or so of driving.

Almost sounds more like tank MPG. Does it reset to 0 after the car has been parked for a while?

no it is a resettable cumulative mpg... when I start it up it brings me to where I left off. I will take pics of it once I try to do more rigorous testing.