I did an experiment over the last two tanks and have been driving my car more aggressively; I try to ignore the mileage of the car and have been speeding and accelerating hard here in the city and the differences between driving the car lightly (hybrid technique) and normally (like i do with any other car) according to my display is about 1L more per 100KM or from 4.5L/100KM to 5.5L/100KM.

When i fill, I stop when the gas pump reaches 37.5L to try and keep my hand calculations consistent.

Actual Hand Calculated mileage are:
Hybrid style driving for me is about 800KM(give or take 2 or 3KM) per 37.5L which is 50MPG
and (my) Normal Style (aggressive ) driving is 726KM and 730KM (last two tanks hand calculated) for 37.5L or 45.6MPG.

I always have my A/C on except if my fiance is driving/riding with me, or when someone calls me on the phone; the A/C gets so loud now that is hot outside .
I think i'm quite comfortable with 45.6MPG, from now on I'll just let the car's computer handle the gas mileage while i worry about my driving Sometimes I even find myself travelling faster than most drivers out there


just thought i'd share


regards,
gj

GJ -

I really enjoyed your post. I'm in the process of trying to get a Prius right now (my credit union is working with dealers to find one) and I've been wondering about exactly what you posted.

Right now I do what I can to help my FE (no jackrabbit starts, that kind of thing), but I don't have much interest in trying to be a hypermiler. It already takes me over an hour to get to work!

Thanks again for the informative post!

Mike

(that's what my car tells me, so it must be true)

Getting the most out of a Prius doesn't require driving slow. It helps, but it's not required. This thread has some good techniques.

I was a bit surprised myself after driving aggressively and speeding 20km/hr above the speed limit here in the city that the fuel consumption is actually not too bad: at times it says 5L/100KM and more or less above or below that number. I dont see a significant difference in Fuel consumption between trying to get the electric motor to coast from one block to another and not caring and just driving normally. Toyota did a great job in programming the car's computer to handle this task and just let the driver drive normally. This is from my experience.

My tank is currently at 260KM (162mi) and the fuel readout says 5.3L/100KM (44.5MPG), i have 8 out of 10 bars of fuel left, filled up with 37.5L. This is from driving normally: my normal is accelerating pretty briskly, ignoring the hybrid screen and not caring about coasting on electric only, and going about 10 - 20KM/hr above the speed limit in the city which everyone else does I like to keep flow with traffic, or be ahead knowing im still getting better mileage than everyone regardless if i'm speeding

thanks for reading,
best regards,
gj

I just purchased my 2006 Prius on 6/15/06. I am averaging 49.5 mpg, so I must be on the right track. I am wondering if anyone out there can give a simple explaination of the Consumption screen, (the far right column and how that relates to the little car icons I get in the 0 - 30 minute range.) The owners manual didn't help me, hope someone out there can. Thanx

The vertical bar is the average MPG for the last five minute interval. The little car icons are a measure of energy reclaimed by the brakes.

Is this the display you wonder about?



There is a nice web site that discusses this display.

The "OUTSIDE TEMP" shows what it is outside. In cold weather, the MPG tends to go down and it is better to drive slowly to bring everything up to operating temperature before taking on higher speeds.

The touch bottons "ENERGY" and "CONSUMPTION" toggle the display. The "RESET" clears the MPG and miles to the left. This allows you to measure MPG on different segments of a trip.

The green bar on the right is the current MPG. After 5 minutes, the average moves over to the "5--0" bar and any other bars move to the left. In the bars, there are small yellow triangles of regenerative captured energy. For maximum mpg, we try to avoid them but that is not always possible. Few yellow triangles tends to be better.

GOOD LUCK!

Bob Wilson

Operation Iraqi Oil Freedom:

Automatic, stock, project car.

My other 1500 cc car:

Automatic, stock, backup car.
Free speech, dialog and knowledge thrives without the poison of SPAM.

Thanks to all, now I have a better understanding and I learned something today. Safe driving, Suzie