This car is NOT a mileage machine. It was never marketed as one, and one look at the EPA sticker should tell you its not.

If you want pure MPG, trade in for a civic. If you want a (as Xcel puts it) 'semi-luxury' car with nice punch, plenty of room, and better MPG than any American car, then this is for you. This car is a lot of fun to take out into the hills, curves, and interstate for long drives and STILL destroy nearly every other vehicle at the gas pump. 33 is what the EPA says you should be getting- since when is hitting the benchmark bad?

Brake fade: as speed drops and the engine approaches idle speed and autostops, you lose regenerative braking. around 20mph. It takes more pressure on the hydraulic brakes to compensate. It is annoying at first, but hopefully you will soon get the hang of coasting as much as possible, braking as lightly and little as possible, and the issue more or less fades into the background as you get used to it. Ideally, of course, there would be no need to 'get used to' anything, but such is life.

Don't worry about pissing people off- that's their personal anger management issue to work out in therapy. We all learned about what the tortise did to the hare.

MPG: look at my tank history- you'll see I started where you are now. I now get 40.x mpg on a bad day- CC on 60 for my 33mile commute along 50 and 495, 43.x if I DWL. You are past the breakin period (1500, then 3000mi) so all improvement from here on is pure technique, assuming your oil is good and tires are at no less than 32# (I run 38-40). Use neutral a lot- coast coast coast. Pretend like it's a stick, not AT. And keep the 'eco' light on- this requires you to develop a feather touch on the gas pedal. Always be trying to back off the gas a little more, and see if your speed holds up. 5th gear cuts in at 43mph- get above that, and you can hold 5th down to 37 or so.

I don't know what to say about the braking shudder at light pressure- but one or two others here ahve had timing alignment issues with the IMA- if its not feeding/being fed voltage at the right instants it will act like an unbalanced motor. Definitely worth having that checked out- take the service guy for a ride with you.

From the other thread, I agree that the accel lag at 2nd is a pain- I get it a lot coming out of turns when I try to feather-touch the gas to accelerate, but not if I hit it.

Hope you and the car can work out your differences! If you're nearby in MD, perhaps we can get together and look at some techniques to help you mpg? We can compare cars and see if what you feel is different than my car.