I'm looking at a buying a 2003 Civic Hybrid with 46K miles on it. Its at a Ford dealership (so they don't know much about these) but let me have it for the weekend so that I could do a couple of commutes and some weekend city driving. the more I drove it the better I got the hang of maximizing economy, at least according to the digital readout. On my friday commute I only got 43.9 but by monday's commute I managed 46.1.

I attribute part of my increase in mpg from friday to monday with increasing the tire pressure from 40 psi to 44 psi and dropping my cruise control setting from 72 to 68.

when I went to refill the tank, however, my manual calculations revealed only 38 mpg overall (230 miles and 6 gallons ). My overall computer calculated mileage was 44.5 mpg which would have indicated approx. 5.15 gallons of gas usage.

From reading the threads it seems that there is decent evidence that the computer can be overly optimistic. apparently there has been a software update for the computer? I also realize that one fill-up is not an adequate sample size but I did use the same pump and both times (initial and refill) stopped when it shut off automatically. Has anyone else found that much variability with auto shutoff using the same pump? I guess I should have topped off to control that variable better.

My commute details:
90 miles roundtrip, about 80 of which is freeway (I-70 from KC, MO to Lawrence, KS). About 65-70 miles of freeway driving is around 70 mph. I-70 is not flat but its not mountains either, just rolling hills like most of Missouri, Illinois, Wisconsin, etc. Weather has been mid 60s; wind hasn't been an issue.

so, I guess my question is, what kind of mileage should I expect under these conditions? Should I believe the manually calculated 38 mpg? It seems I should be getting much better but a lot of the mileage logs don't seem to indicate the usual highway driving speed or conditions that well. Since this is a used car I want to make sure that there isn't something wrong with it.

Could tires be an issue? The tires appear to be too new to be the originals w/46K miles on them. They are BF Goodrich. What were the original tires on the 2003?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I really need to get a commuter car but this hybrid only makes sense if I can get better mileage than a much cheaper used conventional model.

thanks
Shawn

There are a couple of issues here.

First, let me give some information on myself, my car, and my commute. I have an '04 HCH, with MT. My commute is 112 miles RT, with about 70 of it on interstate highways and 25 percent on country roads in the rolling hills of western NJ. Quite similar to what you have, it seems.

With spring/fall weather, I have come to expect about 55-60 mpg on this route. My driving habits falls into the 62-65 mph range, the roads are getting too congested to do much more.

Now, here are the factors/issues.

The tires may not be the correct tires. I believe (members please correct me), that there were two OEM tires, Dunlops and Bridgestone LRR tires. The Bridgestone B321s can be ordered on-line for about $77 each. I have only used the Bridgestones, and I believe that they have one of the lowest LRR rating. More roll and less resistence. If you are really interested in the car, you could challenge the dealer to put the OEM tires back on (they can probably use the tires for another car).

Second, you may have fallen a victim on the tank MPG of the tank-to-tank spikes we all notice. Sometimes, you just can't predict exactly where the gas pump will stop pumping when it senses full. These type of errors can lead to sporatic jumps and dips in mpg, but they even out in the long run. On my HCH, the dashboard reading (OSD) always reads about 5 percent higher than my actual (your results may vary).

I will guess that the air filter is probably new (as a dealer should have done that type of routine maintenance), but if the dealer changed the oil, they might not have used the special Honda oil (0w20). Changing that to a synthetic oil may also help.

Given what you have told us, I think you have the potential to improve on the 44.5 mpg you got, especially on the run you have. You'll get used the the controls and gauges and "make" the car work better.

Welcome to GreenHybrid.com, I hope this information helps.

-Charlie...

Shawn,

Don't think those are "orginal" tires...not with that many miles. Dealer (or seller) probably stuck on some new "regular" tires, and not the lower resistance tires. That will make some difference.

A lot depends on how you drive and how you use the assist. I think you would find yourself getting better mileage after learning about how to drive the car. A short weekend is not enough (or a half a tank of gas).

I have averaged from 46 to 50 MPG per tank, at the pump. Nearly always, after getting a feel for the car, its closer to 48-49 MPG. My first tank was my worst. Pretty typical. If I take my time on the highway I could do better, as I usually travel from 65-75 MPH.

I think most people can get in the upper 40's without too much trouble. There are some who do much better, and a few who do much worse. I think its all depends on driving habits, the correct tires (and pressure) and as mentioned, even type of oil.

Be sure to check out the average mileage chart on the web site. This will give you lots of ideas on what real people are getting out of thier cars.

Bob

I think you need to now take out a non hybrid and do the same calcs and see if there is a large enough gap to make you feel happy with the hybrid.

If you push it and do everything you can to drive efficiently the civic hybrid can do lots. We were able to push mine up over 80mpg on a 2 or 3 hour commute. And under optimal conditions get it over 100mpg for about 10 miles. Those numbers aren't typical though.

I was able to get 60 or so mpg on my trip from kalamazoo mi to chicago on 94 which included a bit of stop and go road construction. Thats a 160 mile drive. The key is how much do you want to change your habbits. If you want to change them a lot then the hybrid has a lot to offer, if you just want to learn to drive a little better then you should test drive a regular civic and compare your mileage ratings between them. Lots of people tend to drive a hybrid and figure out their real world numbers and then compare those numbers to the epa numbers which obviously isn't a fair comparison..

My hydroponics experiment

You ever notice how hard it is to lip read cartoon characters?
"Crazy is what the sane call Delta Flyer"

My rule of thumb is a conservative rough estimate for highway mileage that goes something like this:

- if you drive <= 55 MPH, you will get 60 MPG
- if you drive <= 65 MPH, you will get 50 MPG
- if you drive 75 MPH or greater, you will get 40 MPG

Your tires, being non-LRR (low rolling resistance), may negatively effect mileage by an MPG or two.

From personal experience, compared to a non-hybrid Civic, you will get about 25-30% better gas mileage in the hybrid, driven in the same manner. You will likely find that you end up driving the hybrid in a more efficient manner, simply because you don't like to see bad MPG numbers on the display -- this will cause the benefit of the hybrid to be greater.

The trip meter and calculated mileage are pretty far apart, I suspect that the small fillup increased the variation and the actual mpg is closer to the trip meter than it appears.

Worst case non LRR tires (of the same size) can impact an HCH by about 3 mpg according to the following article:

http://www.greenseal.org/recommendat...resistance.pdf

It has some useful info, including LRR ratings of some of the better tires, including the OEM ones on the HCH-I.

I had an '04 HCH MT for 2 years and put 43,000 miles on it and for that time I got 48.8 mpg. I drove a minimum of 50 miles per day, mostly on the freeway. It does take time to learn how to drive the car. It took me a few weeks, maybe even a month or two to start getting that mpg.

Good luck.

I have a HCHII with about 1100 miles on it. On all 3 (only 3!) tank fill-ups, my manual calculation has exceeded the mpg computer by about 2 mpg.

Aneil

Aneil Mishra, Ph.D.
http://www.totaltrust.wordpress.com

On my two fill ups, it's been exactly a -2.0 mpg error (meter is reading lower than pump calculated MPG)