I made it to 50!

[fireballer44]

I think from the attached pic its safe to say I broke the 50mpg mark on a trip finally

About 9mi, top 2 are the same route in opposite directions. 35mph roads mostly with few stops.

[TCroly]

Originally Posted by fireballer44

I think from the attached pic its safe to say I broke the 50mpg mark on a trip finally

About 9mi, top 2 are the same route in opposite directions. 35mph roads mostly with few stops.

Good work! Your next goal should be to get 50 MPG for an entire tanlkful.

I can get 45 MPG from a single 20 to 40 mile, low traffic trip on my 09 fit, but I cannot average 45 MPG for a whole tank, 40 MPG is my record.

I want to see some hyper milers getting 50 MPG from an entire tank of fuel on the CRZ.

[fireballer44]

I highly doubt that will ever happen from me...

This wasn't a road I normally drive on. Everything around me in normal daily driving is 50mph with tons of stoplights. Its extremely difficult to top 40mpg in that driving...you can't time these stoplights around here they aren't on a discrete timer. So unless you are content at creeping along at 35 and inducing many horns, expletives, and middle fingers from your fellow motorists then I can't see it happening. I have been averaging in the high 30s and am happy with that.

Besides I love driving too much this hypermiling isn't always that fun.

[bizzybear]

nice job... hypermiling actually CAN be fun if you pay attention to what's only going on inside ur car... if u think of the rest of the cars/drivers outside it might make u feel bad about driving so slow haha...

[dcubed121]

i have never been one to care what others think about my speed(or lack there of)

[fireballer44]

I wont say that I care as much...but to give an example...last week on the way home from work I'm going 55 in a 55 zone. In the right lane. I have some idiot come up and tailgate me...I just keep going 55. So now he turns his brights on and moves over a bit to ensure he hits my left side mirror and shines in my face. While I don't really give a damn what they think I still don't really want to entice people to tailgate me by going 15 under and have to put up with these a-holes every time I want to go anywhere. In theory the more people tailgate me the higher chance i'll get rear ended too...and I don't want to put up with that either. I don't spend much on gas as it is.

But really the main reason is I just don't enjoy driving slow and steady...I'm just a car enthuiast that happened upon a hybrid not a hypermiling enthusiast or ecomentalist.

I will say that everyone should try every now and then to see what you can do...I noticed today in normal trafficy driving that I was better at fine throttle control and its amazing how much difference that can make even without driving any more slowly than others.

[TCroly]

Originally Posted by fireballer44

I wont say that I care as much...but to give an example...last week on the way home from work I'm going 55 in a 55 zone. In the right lane. I have some idiot come up and tailgate me...I just keep going 55. So now he turns his brights on and moves over a bit to ensure he hits my left side mirror and shines in my face. While I don't really give a damn what they think I still don't really want to entice people to tailgate me by going 15 under and have to put up with these a-holes every time I want to go anywhere. In theory the more people tailgate me the higher chance i'll get rear ended too...and I don't want to put up with that either. I don't spend much on gas as it is.

But really the main reason is I just don't enjoy driving slow and steady...I'm just a car enthuiast that happened upon a hybrid not a hypermiling enthusiast or ecomentalist.

I will say that everyone should try every now and then to see what you can do...I noticed today in normal trafficy driving that I was better at fine throttle control and its amazing how much difference that can make even without driving any more slowly than others.

I can totally relate to this. I have always owned fast cars and never gave too much consideration to driving them for fuel economy. Perhaps I may have even been that guy flashing his headlights at you for going 55 in a 55 because everyone else is doing 70.

But I got my Honda fit in 2009, when our fuel prices here on Maui were topping $5.00/gallon. The car was not fast, and I wasn't going to get any thrill from its acceleration. So I slowed down and found a new driving thrill out of trying to get those extra miles out of each gallon of gas.

But with this slow down I did notice that I had become the slowpoke that others would flash their lights at. I also found myself doing things that were actually dangerous in the effort not to touch my brakes and lose that tenth of a MPG that I had just driven 10 miles at sub speed-limit speed to gain.

In the end, I have generally gone back to normal driving, with a bit of what I learned hyper-miling thrown in and use greater effort to save gas when it is safe to. I get 36 to 40 MPG from my fit depending on how much A/C I use. I can only increase this by a maximum of about 10% by applying religious hyper-miling techniques. In the end, that is not much money saved, but can be fun for the effort.

Looking at the MPG posts from CRZ owners, it looks like it is quite easy to exceed the EPA ratings and with just a bit of effort 40 MPG can be maintained as an average. Whether 50 MPG is achievable as a long term average is a matter of some real effort. But keep in mind that the annual gas savings from getting 50 MPG instead of 40 MPG is only 75 gallons (over 15,000 miles). So even at our $3.70/gallon gas here in Maui, I can afford the extra $277/year for a bit more fun and fewer drivers flashing their lights at me.

[fireballer44]

Exactly...when I bought the car I would have been plenty happy with 31mpg around town...my old Accord I got spot on the city mileage of 24. So my numbers ranging between 35-40 is far beyond what I was expecting.

I do think 50mpg is possible consistently depending on what type of situation you drive in. Before I moved to my house, I used to drive the exact route I topped 50mpg on every single day to work. The entire route is 30-35mph with very little stopping, there are not a whole lot of places to turn off (and therefore slow you down as you wait on the person to turn) as it backs up to a lot of the big-money neighborhoods with secure entrances so an entire huge neighborhood will only have one place to go in/out. The road is usually littered with radar-shooting cops as well so only the biggest idiots go over the limit. I have little doubt that even without ridiculous hypermiling I would be able to hit a consistent 48-50mpg.

I typically drive about 60mph in a 55mph zone, this particular case is on my way home from work and probably once a week someone gets pulled over on it. Maybe these idiots don't come through here much late in the evening, or maybe they just don't care. But I'm more than content to just cruise at the limit rather than spend my time scanning for cops. While I've never really been a true speed demon, I'm still at the point where I just can't risk getting caught going 5 over and getting a ticket. It just costs too much on insurance after a ticket; even now that I've passed the 25yo barrier, my no tickets record is still my biggest discount.

[ESQ]

I'm new to the site. Picked up my CRZ about 4 weeks ago. First tank averaged 48.3mpg. Second tank is half way through and presently 47.3 mpg. I'm hypermiling as much as possible local and highway. I turned in a 2010 Insight which I had for 1 year, 9,000 miles, and the lifetime average was 57.4 mpg (many tank fulls averaged over 60 mpg). So, there is a big difference between my experience with the Insight and this CRZ. I hope to average over 50mpg on the CRZ after it breaks in.

[David_PA]

Originally Posted by ESQ

I'm new to the site. Picked up my CRZ about 4 weeks ago. First tank averaged 48.3mpg. Second tank is half way through and presently 47.3 mpg. I'm hypermiling as much as possible local and highway. I turned in a 2010 Insight which I had for 1 year, 9,000 miles, and the lifetime average was 57.4 mpg (many tank fulls averaged over 60 mpg). So, there is a big difference between my experience with the Insight and this CRZ. I hope to average over 50mpg on the CRZ after it breaks in.

Fantastic numbers ESQ!!!

Do you drive in city traffic? If yes, what kinds of tricks do you use? What about going up hills; how do you do that?