I have just taken my Honda HCH around a 15 mile circuit, no air and very careful feathering of throttle and got an indicated 44.5 mpg. I then took my Passat TDI wagon on the same circuit, no air, but normal driving ( I mean no one passed me and I accelerated at stoplights and certainly no feathering). On the Passat I got 37.2 mpg. Lastly, I took the HCH back on the same route and put on the total mileage indicator so I did not see the mpg, and I drove it like I drove the Passat---normal acceleration. At the end I checked the mpg and it was 36.2 . Now I am really confused.

Nothing really confusing about that to me... The HCH has the ability to get good mileage, it doesn't just automatically get good mileage if you drive totally normally.

Many people come here complaining about low mileage in the HCH, and the reality is that if you don't try for mileage you'll get below average, it's been tested and confirmed, 25 MPG is possible.

2001 Prius Photos       2005 Prius Photos
1992 Mitsubishi Delica Diesel-WVO Hybrid Photos

I read car & driver's comparison of the TDI, HCH, Prius and Echo. They found the same thing, that in town the TDI got by far the worst mileage (about 34 or something like that), but on the highway it was right up there with the others (not a big difference between the 4 in the hiway test-all around 42 +/- 2 mpg).

I was on the verge of seriously considering a TDI of some sort, probably a jetta wagon. I have a diesel truck as well and I was entertainning the idea of getting my own filler tank for biodiesel and then being totally petrolium free in our household, getting it delivered by truck. Still love the idea but biodiesel is hard to get here in the southwest and I had some problems with the VW. I didn't get one for four reasons.
1. The VW's were horribly overpriced - used ones with 40k mi selling for just a couple thousand less than new ones which were all over $25k. Bought my HCH with 14k mi for $18,000.
2. I don't have the confidence in the quality, fit & finish of the VW's compared with the japanese options.
3. The local dealer is a really slimy place and every time I talked to a sales person there I felt like I was dealing with Christopher Walken.
4. I HATE the VW key. I know it seems silly but I don't want to carry that stupid thing around.

Oops, now I see that I misread your post slightyly. I also found that if you drive the HCH the same way you would drive a regular car you can get a pretty slim improvement in mileage. I guess the rationale is that with the hybrid you are capable of much larger improvements with driving style than you are with a regular car. That said, I feel it's a little deceiving to advertise the great mileage you can get with these hybrids, because you have to learn to drive them differently to see dramatic improvements. Well, if you learn to drive with ultimate economy in mind, you can make big economy improvements in your regular car too. So there's one level of improvement with the hybrid upgrade, then it's compounded with a secondary improvement of driving more economically, together they make a large improvement, but comparing that to regular driving in a regular car isn't exactly fair IMHO.

Schwa, I'm with you. I think hypermiling a VW can only get you so far - certainly WAAAAY better than 99% of what's out there, but with a limit on how attainable FE is. Like a cap. The HCH, Prius, or Insight may post numbers similar to some diesel vehicles when driven normally, but if you're driving for mileage, have a much greater capability. Sky's the limit.

Again, this is why I believe that a hybrid diesel would be the best of both worlds. Diesels seem to be more forgiving when it comes to "driving normally", while hybridizing the diesel would offer the same degree of eimprovements as the hybrids gain over regular gas cars, both for those who drive "normally", and those who hypermile.

Honda Hyb= Quiet! Quality! Odorless!
VW diesel= Noisy! Less quality! Nasty smelly diesel!

I have had oportunity to do transfers on diesel trucks. The diesel pumps at most stations are really nasty and it always reminds me of one reason why I would not want one.

Not if you use biodiesel! :-)

2.- That is sad really. I owned several VWs starting with the fabled Beetle and ending with a Rabbit. I loved its German engineering. But in 1986, I went Japanese, and have never looked back. VW has fallen behind in a lot of things, mostly on its reliability.

3-. Down here is just the same. And if you have problems with reliability, which you'll have, an unccoperative or difficult dealer is an owner's nightmare. A friend of mine experienced decoloration on its brand new Jetta on the hood. After months of haggling, the dealership repainted it. But on the back, there were fingerprints with a different color paint! And the dealer said that the car had come in with those already there! Can you believe that.