New Ford Focus owner

[dleefoto]

Never had a car to call my own. I finally had the opportunity to purchase a car for under 15k. I bought a 2010 ford focus se w/ a 2.0L inline 4 banger and a 5 spd trans. Estimated hwy mpg is 35. After putting 200 miles on the car w/ 40% back roads and 60% hwy my tank average is 40.7mpg (according to onboard mpg "calculator") I went under budget w/ this car since Ford was giving 3500 cash back including college student discounts. Ordered a scangauge ll off the bat. I'm looking forward to starting my own gas log and reading up on what has been working for everyone else, this site is more helpful than I could have ever imagined.

I always monitored my driving techniques when using my families cars. So far I managed to get 35mpg tank out of my fathers '95 saab 900 V6 and 41mpg tank on my mothers '04 saab 9-3 turbo.

[dleefoto]

Things I do in regards to driving
- < 80% throttle
- Proper tire psi
- limited braking
- some pulse&glide on the hwy
Basic things like that, hope to expand this list after the SGll gets here.

Things I don't do
- Engine off Gliding
- Go under 10mph of the posted speedlimit
- I'm not sold on constant neutral shifts, it's a new car... tell me it's okay to do it and I'll coast for days!
-mods that cost $$$ and produce results in the fractions of mpg. If the savings from a specific mod won't/can't pay itself off in 3 years I can't justify it.

Mods I'm considering
-aero wheel covers
-rear wheel arch covers (in combination w/ aero covers?)
I want a roof rack for my road bike but that goes against so many rules haha.

Please give me some feedback! Things to change or consider. I'm here to learn.

[rbrowning]

I had two new Fords and both did the same thing. After about 8-900 miles the MPG went up about 1. After about 2K miles it went up about about 1 more MPG. I figured the first step was friction being reduced due to machined surfaces smoothing out after rubbing together. Why the second step, I have no idea, but I saw it twice and a friend reported the same thing. I didn't switch to synthetic oil until after 3K miles.

[dleefoto]

Yeah I have heard that as well! The car only has 400 miles on it. It's hard to hypermile w/ it since it is still in the "break in" period. They do this at the factory but you should vary your speed and don't babe it TOO much during the first 1,000 miles. I don't drive it hard but I can't wait until it's broken in.

Does anyone think a 600 mile tank (13.5gal) is out of reach w/o coasting w/ the engine off? thats a 44.44mpg tank.

[theycallmeebryan]

My girlfriend has a 2010 focus as well... nice little cars. Hers is an automatic. That MPG display on the dash is really cool.

Mind you, my girlfriend knows nothing about cars nor how to improve fuel economy.

One day we had a little competition. Going to the movies, i bet her an icecream sundae that i could drive there and get better mpg on the way there than she would on the back. I reset the meter right before i took off from the house and using my techniques (except EOC, she doesn't like when i do that) i was able to achieve 44mpg displayed. Along the way i explained to her how to drive more efficiently. Try not to brake, accelerate easy and try to get just over 40mph (where the torque converter locks up), don't go over 55mph, avoid stopping, avoid braking.

When she got behind the wheel, it was absolutely amazing how her driving changed once she saw how the MPG meter changed in different situations. She first realized that the mpg reading would drastically decrease if she had to stop. She would say "no no no turn green turn green". Then if there was a stop sign or red light ahead she would let off the throttle way early (and i mean, the car would have come to a stop before the sign if we continued coasting) and try to coast to it because the MPG reading would increase while coasting. Then she started driving very slowly and i encouraged her to speed up to just over 40mph. She did and noticed that the mpg's were slowly increasing.

She was able to achieve 38mpg on the way home. Her previous average was 35mpg.

So she was able to improve just by watching the gauge and learning how different driving styles influence it!