Test drove a 2015 Mirage (update: bought it ... 5-speed manual)

[user removed]

The ride home tomorrow will duplicate drive when I bought my Echo a few years ago. Beautiful country road divided, 4 lane with a 60 mph speed limit and beautiful coasting hills, almost devoid of traffic lights with the rest time able, last 8 miles of 120.

I got 50 mpg in the Echo on that drive, I'll know the revs per mile after that. The 75 mm bore 90 mm stroke and almost 11 to 1 compression ratio are keys to MPG. I'll have a report tomorrow if the loaner is a manual Mirage which I requested.

regards
mech

[Daox]

Woo, congrats on the new car. I also really liked the Mirage (cvt) when I tested it for a week. I'd throw a rear sway bar on for a bit more fun and call it good. The MPG the car knocks down is pretty ridiculous. I averaged 50 mpg in summer for the week I had it.

[California98Civic]

I saw one of these little rides parked at work yesterday. Sweet little car. Congrats!

[Hersbird]

Congrats! When they say the resale is bad for one that is based on a percentage of MSRP. So if they have $1500 or $2000 rebates that is like $6000 rebate on a new 4x4 pickup. Then even if the resale bad compared to the pickup look at the actual dollar number of the depreciation not the percent. Like you said a used one would have only saved you $1-2k and no long warranty. Guy who buys a high resale car or truck for $35k loses thousands more then you do and even more when you factor operating costs.

[Chrysler kid]

Meh.

Race the sentra against the mirage.

[MPGomatic]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

The Fiesta will definitely be more entertaining to a traditional "enthusiast". The Mirage is roomier inside and will spank the Ford's MPG, without the niggling concern of turbo longevity. I haven't driven a 1.0t Fiesta, but would love to.

Go drive it, Metro! The 1.0L Fiesta is a hoot. Capable of remarkable MPGs if you can stay out of the boost. It's not insanely fun like the ST (most fun you can have for $21K), but it delivers a nice combo of responsiveness and efficiency. The back seat is tight, no doubt about that, but the current car seems like it might be a tiny bit better than the early models.

Here's a clip I shot with it last summer:
https://youtu.be/agJhftXqBZs

[MPGomatic]

Congrats on the new ride and happy birthday to pops! Looking forward to seeing the mileage you squeeze out of it and the inevitable mods.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by Chrysler kid

to me the mirage is ugly

I'm not a fan of the styling either. Looks dated. I'll overlook it because at least they put some effort into factory aero: cd 0.28 is way better than average for this body style.

and under powered.

That's relative. 35% more power than a last gen. Metro, and barely weighs 100 lbs more. I appreciate the lengths Mitsu's engineers went to design efficiency into the whole package.

I just wish they'd made it steer and handle better out of the box. That would have avoided a lot of criticism the car has had from the typical auto reviewers, and it wouldn't have hurt MPG.

[MPGomatic]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

I just wish they'd made it steer and handle better out of the box. That would have avoided a lot of criticism the car has had from the typical auto reviewers, and it wouldn't have hurt MPG.

I'm not a typical auto reviewer, but my immediate impression was that the Mirage was pulled out of the oven a little too early. It just needs a bit of suspension refinement. I went looking for aftermarket springs right after driving it. At the time (shortly after the Mirage was released), there were no aftermarket springs on the market. Just saw RS-R springs on eBay.

I'd love to do an MPG-boosted SEMA build with the Mirage …

[Cd]

At first glance, i wondered what a Porsche Cayenne was doing at the Economy run.
At second glance, I realized it was a Mirage I was seeing.




I watched a review of the car, and the reviewer said ( here we go again ) that the car looks this way to be "aerodynamic".
Isn't .27 pretty close to what the Mercedes A class gets ?