I haven't been by almost since I joined the forum, but I have spent a LOT of time in my FEH since I bought it July 1st. As of today I have 5,148 miles on it. I have been on trips, commuting, down to the hunting camp, used it to haul junk to Goodwill, and just about everything you can imagine. I had read some threads about what to expect with mileage as the car got broken in, but I was still surprised. At first I was running about 30 mpg, even when trying hard. Then I began to learn the car, and mileage started to improve. Then, at just over 2,000 miles, mileage started improving! Now, if I am commuting in typical Atlanta gridlock, I can pull down as much as 38 mpg with careful driving!

I fill up the tank far more often than I need to, but it is so darned much fun calculating the mileage!

This is a great all-around car, and as gas prices pass $3 per gallon I am so glad I took the plunge!

Great!

I'm glad to see such high numbers for the Escape Hybrid. Personally, I wasn't entirely sure what to expect from a hybrid SUV, but you are beating my '97 Cavy hands down! I have NOTHING against foreign auto manufactuerers whatsoever, but it is nice to see a home-grown auto company beginning to embrace hybrids. Cheers!

John Smash!!

Great mileage! I'm having similar success in non-highway situations with my 4WD FEH.

Folks aren't usually very impressed when they find I'm getting mpg's in the low 30's on average, but here's something I figured out today on fueleconomy.gov. There are only six 2005 cars/trucks that get significantly better mileage than the FEH:

Honda Civic Hybrid
Honda Insight
Toyota Corolla (some models)
Toyota Prius
Volkswagen Golf (some models)
Volkswagen Jetta (some models)

There are many cars that get comparable mileage, but only one is a midsize (the Hyundai Elantra). All others are sub-compact or compact.

I'm disappointed that Ford isn't getting much credit for producing a 4WD SUV with the mpg's of a subcompact, and PZEV to boot.

-- Hal

I'll give kudos to Ford for pursuing the technology, but they didn't invest in the innovation; they purchased from Toyota instead. I hope the US automakers all hop on board soon and join the surge toward conservationalist cars by pioneering as some overseas companies have, but at least Ford has attempted to catch up in its own way.

Hi Hal&Judy:

___I do not know if your Escape HEV is a PZEV or not but there are those in some areas of the country that are at best LEV’s. The EPA calls them “Clean Vehicles” but the truth be told, there are those that aren’t much to brag about including some purchased/sold in Atlanta, Chicago/Gary/Lake County, Denver/Boulder and Milwaukee/Racine specifically

___In either case, to receive 30 + in a 4WD SUV is better then what most are receiving in their Civic’s and Corolla’s let alone everything else!

___Good Luck

___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net

Over 5K in three months, that's quite a bit of driving. I got mine June 1st, and I'm approaching 4K, and I have what many would consider a monster commute. (82 miles round trip.)

It's kind of amazing to see the milage improve and improve with age, and as the only change I've made to my driving style since about the second tank is that I recently dropped drafting, and my milage is still improving. It's got to be the car getting better. I'm on my second tank above 33 MPG, and drive in a modified style that's both normal traffic and fuel efficient; that is, without trying to get exceptional milage.

Kind of a funny thing about gas prices. Before I got mine, I did all sorts of research, and even made a quick little Excel spreadsheet to see if it was advantagous in the long run to get a FEH rather than a conventional Escape. I figured that it would take me about five years to break even, and after 10 years I'd come out quite a bit ahead. Using a better version that I got from here, with the rise in gas prices, I break even by the second year.

First 4WD Hypermiler

Have you read the FEH FAQ?

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Read My Automotive Blog at Rich Rambles

Are you sure that Ford merely bought the technology and plugged it in? I've heard that story from Toyota salesman who are hawking the Highlander (they say the FEH is old technology), but Ford's people claim they did a lot of engineering on their own, but some of it would have violated Toyota's patents, so Toyota needed to be compensated. My sense is there had to have been a great deal of work involved in adapting the ideas to a heavier, 4WD vehicle (hardware and software). From what I've read, the Escape system is very different from the one in the Highlander (one motor vs. three, and so on). And for what its worth, the behavior of FEH hybrid system is very different from that of a Prius. The FEH traction motor has a whole lot more torque and stays on in low-speed situations where the Prius motor goes over to the ICE, for one thing.

As an aside, one of the things that impresses me about the FEH is that the hybrid system just keeps doing its normal thing while climbing mountains, or on jeep roads, or in the snow, and so forth. Ascending a 5000 foot mountain in Tennessee, and going back down the other side, we got over 30 mpgs overall. I don't know why it impresses me, it just does.

Yes, was this a missstep on Ford's part? Mine is PZEV, because I bought it close to an urban area in the NE where those standards are required; I made sure it was PZEV or I wouldn't have bought it. Ford should have made them all PZEV, unless there's a good reason they didn't that I'm not aware of.