[priusowner]

I've had my '05 Prius since May '05.
Mostly around town I get 40-44mpg, nowhere near 60!
Has ANYONE gotten close?

Maybe I have a lemon...

 

[mikepaul]

My around-town MPGs were 47 with the OEM tires and maybe 44 with the TripleTreds if I don't take a road trip.

I find that the car will maintain an average of 47 if a road trip pushes it that high, but just driving around here never gets that high except right after a fill-up. I'm like 60 miles into the latest tank, and was at 43MPG or so this morning. No road trip, but I do need to go across town later.

A lemon would probably never get to 44MPG on the highway. Take it out for a decent drive at 55MPH and see what happens, and also what happens later...

 

[jeromep]

I've had my '05 Prius since May '05.
Mostly around town I get 40-44mpg, nowhere near 60!
Has ANYONE gotten close?

Maybe I have a lemon...

I'm sure you don't have a lemon. Lemons like to live in the dealer's service bay and frequently leave you stranded.

I'm afraid, before I can provide you with any good answers, I have to ask some questions.

1. What are your front and rear tire pressures?[/*:m:3qhz8zk5]
2. How many miles do you have on the car?[/*:m:3qhz8zk5]
3. How long are your trips, short/long?[/*:m:3qhz8zk5]

To be totally honest, these are the three largest factors that affect mileage. The only one you have control over is air pressure in tires.

First off, the decal on the driver's side B pillar will give you the factory specifications for air pressure. Note that there is a 2 psi difference between the front and rear tires; fronts are higher pressure than rears.

Second, these cars benefit from engine break in. As the car becomes broken in they will generally get better mileage.

Weather is another factor. If it is cool out the ICE will run longer to warm up the catalytic converters and to create heat for the cabin. If the weather is very hot the ICE runs a little more to generate electric power for the air conditioning.

Short trips in the car are killer to mileage. Longer commutes benefit from greater mileage numbers because the ICE has time to warm up and operate in its most efficient band. I'm a short commuter and I get about the same mileage as you, but when I take a trip someplace and have to do a lot of urban driving, my mileage really increases.

All in all give it some time. Also, if you post answers to my questions you will get more intelligent responses from others and myself.

 

[ehurtley]

I've had my '05 Prius since May '05.
Mostly around town I get 40-44mpg, nowhere near 60!
Has ANYONE gotten close?

Maybe I have a lemon...

For the first year, driving what I thought was fairly conservatively, I averaged 45mpg. Since then, driving 'efficiently', but not necessarily conservatively, I am averaging 50-60.

P.S. 60 MPG is the EPA estimate for 'city' driving. The EPA estimates are totally artificial, and are only good to compare one car to another, NOT as a number to actually expect. (On any car.)

That said, I can, with some work, get 60 MPG in 'city' driving. In fact, I can EASILY get 60 MPG in driving that is very similar to the EPA's 51 MPG highway test. (Their 'higway' rating is more of a 'rural highway', it is *NOT* 'high speed, long-distance freeway' driving.)

 

[priusowner]

As one of you said (and I DO appreciate your replies)

What are your front and rear tire pressures? 40 psi all around

How many miles do you have on the car? 5,600

How long are your trips, short/long? mostly around Tampa, and I do notice a tendency to stay closer to 50mpg if I go to St. Pete or Dade City

A tech at the dealer said he drives from San Antonio to Brandon every day and keeps 44 psi in his tires but doesn't get much over 50mpg...

 

[G. McCurdy]

I haven't figured this mpg thing out completely....yet.

I played around with the Shell gas and my mpg went up higher than it was with Chevron (that was with Shell's higher octane, more detergent V-Power stuff). Mpg was running around 48-49 mpg and it pretty much remained the same with their lower octane stuff as well. Stayed with it for around 3 tanks and all was well.

Then.......

I recently moved back to the Chevron low octane (regular) and my mpg took a hit and now I'm back down to 39-40 mpg range!??! It was more convenient as it is the corner mini-market Chevron, but my mpg suffers for some reason from that of the Shell brand/blend and maybe a small change makes for the dramatic difference.

I do know the fuel mix gets altered in the winter months in California which supposedly lowers the mpg level as well. Maybe the Chevron station had their tanks filled with the winter blend? Dunno, but it is odd why it differs between brands. Seems it almost has to be the blend.

Fwiw, some consumersearch.com site showed the average of the Prius to be around 41-48 mpg as I recall from a poll of owners. Actually, discussing Prius mpg is more like a big fish story: "Yours must be broke. Mine gets 68 mpg." (Yeah, that's the ticket!) :wink:

 

[DanMan32]

Ah, another fellow Tampa Bay resident. OK, I'll be specific then.

Last tank I got 61 MPG according to the display, mostly driving from Spring Hill to Largo/Clearwater and back (stopping in New Port Richey on the way home much of the time) along US19 for my daily commute which is about 48 miles. When I attend church in New Port Richey, I do have short trips with a heated cabin, so my MPG drops.

We share the same weather, so I won't say much about that. My AC is set to 76 degrees.

Oil filled to 3.5 Quarts. Previous fills were a bit over the full mark. Probably lost a couple of miles per gallon because of this.
Tire pressure 40/38.
I frequently use Cruise Control, even on secondary roads. Often I drive more with the CC stick than the accelerator pedal.
I try to anticipate lights and coast as much as possible, but I am not anal about it. I probably could improve efficiency in this area by 50% if I really wanted to work at it.

During the summer, my MPG was closer to low to mid 50's. When I was visiting a friend in Tampa during June and July, I did more highway driving, so my mileage was closer to 52 for the whole tank, wich included my commute on US19. During the drive on the Suncoast, it was closer to 46 doing a legal 70MPH.
I took a trip to Tampa from Spring Hill last Saturday for a concert using the Suncoast/veterans, but limited my speed to 55. Mileage then was about 60.

 

[mrv]

Published information from Toyota:

Tips for better Prius Gas mileage (near end of Spring 2004 newsletter):
http://www.toyota.com/html/hybridsynerg ... ng2004.pdf

Prius Fuel Economy: Explaining the EPA Ratings
Toyota explains what the EPA ratings actually mean, and lists ways to
improve your MPG
http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/toy ... sage/71431
http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/Pri ... ssage/2742

Prius Fuel Economy Factsheet:
http://www.toyota.com/images/vehicles/p ... conomy.pdf

Can I expect to get over 50MPG in the new Prius?
(see question #6): http://www.toyota.com/vehicles/2005/prius/faq.html

More MPG tips are in the Prius User's Guide:
http://john1701a.com/prius/prius-userguide.htm

Gas Mileage Tips from the EPA:
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/drive.shtml

There are also more MPG tips in your Owner's Manual.

BTW: it's more helpful if you tell us what your tire pressures are, when you last had service (and how that went), what the weather is like in your area, the terrain, speed, and length of your usual trip, how much cargo you usually carry, and what your temperature controls are set to... along with your driving style, and how your previous vehicles
fared against their EPA numbers. there are a lot of factors...

There is a Prius MPG calculator for the Classic Prius in the toyota-prius yahoogroup's FAQs, but I don't think anyone has recalibrated it for the 2004+ Prius
yet, but it should give you some ideas where you might be losing your fuel economy:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/toyota-prius/message/6299


meanwhile, on the topic of published EPA ratings, I suggest reading the following article (with plenty of citations for source data):
http://www.bluewaternetwork.org/reports ... ehood2.pdf
"FUEL ECONOMY FALSEHOODS: How government misrepresentation of fuel economy hinders efforts to reduce global warming and US dependence on
foreign oil" by the Bluewater Network, 2002

 

[ehurtley]

I haven't figured this mpg thing out completely....yet.

I played around with the Shell gas and my mpg went up higher than it was with Chevron (that was with Shell's higher octane, more detergent V-Power stuff). Mpg was running around 48-49 mpg and it pretty much remained the same with their lower octane stuff as well. Stayed with it for around 3 tanks and all was well.

The whole octane thing seems odd to me.

Higher octane gas contains LESS power. It is 'diluted' on purpose to prevent knocking. Higher octane gas actually should mean LOWER mileage, not higher. ENGINES that require more octane generally produce more power than engines that don't require high octane. But in a given engine, higher octane of the same fuel means less power, and lower mileage. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octane_rating) It could be that Shell's gas formula simply has more energy than Chevron's in your area, and that running lower octane Shell would produce an equivalent increase in mileage over Chevron. (Detergents also lower power/mileage, but can help clean an engine, which lets the engine more efficiently use the gasoline's energy; also lots of localities use 'winter blend' gas that helps lower emissions in colder weather, but also has less energy.)

In short, use 87 octane gas. Try different brands to find the one that works best for you; but keep it at 87 octane.

 

[Hep]

When I drive into Wisconsin (it's hard to avoid) on Minnesota gas (which contains 10% ethanol) I get about two mpg less than when I return to Minnesota (yeah) with Wisconsin gas (nothing to do with the cheese and brats).

 

[DanMan32]

This tank I am getting 1-2 MPG less than last tank. This tank I used Shell, last tank was Hess.
Now last tank I had an additional passenger on only 5 trips (towards the last half of the tank guage) where this tank was....Hmm, also 5 trips so far, but this time at the beginning of the tank.

I seem to get lower mileage out of Shell and Chevron, probably due to the extra detergents. Extra detergents won't increase mileage if the engine is already pretty clean, but will have less energy per gallon of gas.

 

[mikepaul]

I seem to get lower mileage out of Shell and Chevron, probably due to the extra detergents. Extra detergents won't increase mileage if the engine is already pretty clean, but will have less energy per gallon of gas.

I keep wanting to try Texaco with Techron (billboards galore but almost no stations here anymore) to see if it is as good as the old Texaco was, but if it's just Chevron gas now I may not bother...

 

[DanMan32]

Maybe someone should do a study on the energy content of several brands of gas. Maybe different octanes too.

 

[hyperion]

Didn't we have a post on an earlier thread posted by someone working in a fuel terminal who stated all different brand tank trucks filled up from the same storage tanks?
Imagination probably explains a lot about different fuel consumption. I never did think stuffing a tiger in a tank made the car run better. Maybe a polar bear or canary but a tiger! ......NAHH.......

 

[puddlejumper]

MyMPG is disappointing too

I just filled up a second tank and are wondering why our MPG is so low. The first tank was 39 mpg. I mostly drove it around town with trips of 10-20 minutes. I took it out on one long road trip of about 60 miles each way. Going there it was stop an go most of the way and coming back it was clear sailing. I kept my eye on the display where it shows fuel consumption and it was always about the same. I don't expect to get perfect fuel, but this is seriously ridiculose. All of my previous cars got with a couple of mile of the offical MPG, including a Metro which managed to get 46 MPG even blazing down crazy CA highways at 78 mph. I really expected this car to do better then a Metro.

 

[ehurtley]

Re: MyMPG is disappointing too

I just filled up a second tank and are wondering why our MPG is so low. The first tank was 39 mpg. I mostly drove it around town with trips of 10-20 minutes. I took it out on one long road trip of about 60 miles each way. Going there it was stop an go most of the way and coming back it was clear sailing. I kept my eye on the display where it shows fuel consumption and it was always about the same. I don't expect to get perfect fuel, but this is seriously ridiculose. All of my previous cars got with a couple of mile of the offical MPG, including a Metro which managed to get 46 MPG even blazing down crazy CA highways at 78 mph. I really expected this car to do better then a Metro.

Think about the size and weight difference between a Prius and a Metro.

If you wanted a Metro replacement, you should have bought a Honda Insight. I'm not trying to be mean/rude, but people who compare a 1000 pound tinfoil car to a midsize car are expecting too much. But, if you really want to compare it, wait until your Prius has as many miles as your Metro had.

That said, I *CAN* get 60 MPG. Oddly, driving in conditions closest to the EPA's 'Highway' test, which the EPA only rates it at 51 MPG.

 

[salsawonder]

I have almost my first 5000 on my prri and am getting the low 40's in a hilly area of san diego. i also like to drive faster. a friend lives in santa barbara and has twice the commute that i do in LA type traffic. She gets low 50's. on a trip i get high 40's. still way better than the sport trac!

 

[siprelle]

In measuring mileage on my '05, with tire pressures, loads, terrain, speeds, most "mileage factors" essentially constant, I find that maintaining an engine temperature at warm operational range is a very important factor - which is controllable only by driving requirements. Short trips equal lousy MPG - long (duration) trips equal much better MPG. I also average in the low 40's, but any trip that "keeps it hot" produces 50+ MPG over successive tanks.

 

[edlambert]

Re:Gas milage....

I've been averaging around 56mpg.Since I got the car in July.It's getting colder here in Maine 35F. this morning and I was told it is going to drop.My commute is mostly 40mph (20min.)10 mi.Using the pulse and glide helps alot.I had Goodyear comfortreads on my last car and took quite an mpg hit (7%).Getting better milage means alot even if the tires are safer.Getting the mpg's is possible even 60! But it does require effort.

Regards,Ed

 

[XLR8]

Can someone explain the "Pulse & Glide" technique to me please?
Thanks,

Aaron