Hi Everyone,

I'm thrilled to be part of this community and excited to post my first set of results for my HCH2. First I should mention that I purchased this vehicle 2 weeks ago and I live near Chicago. It has been FREEZING cold and I've had a lot of short trips and cold starts so I know my MPG will improve but here's what I have so far. I filled the gas tank today (first time) with two bars left on my fuel gauge and 451 miles and it clicked at exactly 10 gallons (go figure) for an average of 45.1! I think that's pretty good for my first tank and weather considering. As a side note I drove 43 miles today after filling it up and got 52.9 MPG but I think it had more to do with weather again (it was 65 today!). so far I love this car although it's definately not the most comfortable car I've ever had.

Good start Jason. It is a great car. Pretty hard to do better than that! Enjoy, H

It all depends on how you drive. One of the first things I did learned on Priuschat, was to air up the tires to 40 PSI. My first tank came in at 49 MPG, which you can do if you baby the car. Today I was running around town looking for some music stores, so I reset the second trip meter to see what the car would do on pure city driving. Top speed about 35 miles per hour, but mostly about 30, with lots of stop and go, and gently rolling hills, After about 14 miles of this, I showed 61 MPG--but it took a lot of babying! I probably won't worry too much about getting fantastic mileage--45 MPG will do me fine, and you won't have worry too much about how you drive. I'm heading out west here in 3 weeks, will be interesting to see what it does on pure highway driving. I have to admit, since it is a trek I do every 6 weeks,I will probably set the speed a bit higher than I did with the previous vehicle, and sacrifice some economy.

Excellent, Jason!
And, welcome to the club.

Steve

STOP terrorism - Drive a HYBRID

Vehicles:
350 miles a week ------------ 2006 HCH II, Magnetic Pearl, w/NAVI (born on May 25, 2006)
350 miles a month ---------- 2003 Mazda Tribute ES-V6
350 miles a year (for now) - 1986 Mercedes 560SL

Congrats!

http://greenhybrid.com/compare/mileage/car/3686.html

http://greenhybrid.com/compare/mileage/car/4955.html

While you calculated 45.1mpg what did the mpg gauge state on your tach ? I find the tach to be off by a couple mpg most of the time. Even when I drive to a point where no bars are show on my fuel guage, I still can not fill the tank more than 10 gallons on average. I attempted to fill it up to the rim once and came out with 11.7 gallons.

Since our tank is 12.3 gallons.... does that mean our reserve is 2.3 gallons ?

Great job Jason - the numbers will go way above 50 for you when it warms up...

I tend to see actual mpg (pumped gas/trip odometer) runs 1-2mpg above the indicated tank mpg.

Yes. When empty, you can put some 13.something gallons to the rim. I can't find the thread right now, but someone around here ran it completely empty, then filled to the neck. Other than that, people have had differing opinions on the subject. Most people can get somewhere around 13.2 gallons in. Personally, the most I have gotten is 10.5. After the last light goes out, I try not to go more than 20 miles. I think sometimes it goes out sooner though.

Unfortunately I "zeroe'd out" my Trip A a few times before letting it run so I'm unable to tell if the MPG's are off vs calculating it by hand but I will post my second tanks readings as soon as I can. What I have noticed is that I'm getting @30 miles per fuel guage square, if that makes sense. I haven't counted how many squares there are so I'm not sure what that translates into but I'm hoping to get past 500 miles before I'm down to my last two squares.

Don't be afraid of that gas light coming on. It doesn't mean you need to fill her up yet. You can easily get another 50 or more miles out of those last two bars. I, personally don't fill up 'til after the last bar disappears and I've never had to put more than 10.5 gallons in it.