In response to a recent thread of similar title....

Monday I had the best one-way segment ever in my FEH.

On the ScanGauge ( glad I bought that thing ) after 45.7 miles I had 126 MPG!
After 55.5 miles, and a little gasoline later, I kept it up at 120 MPG.

All in all, round trip, I used 3.9 gallons for 181.6 miles. ( 46.56 MPG )

As you may have guessed, this involved a lot of mountain driving.
Not only did I have lots of hills to coast down, but thinner air as well.

Still, it takes quite a bit of planning to get over 125 MPG for an hour straight.

I used EV at about 35 MPH to get over those camel humps, bringing the battery SOC down, then gently dragged the regen brakes on the downside, both to not overheat the battery, and also to keep speeds under 40 MPH. When the battery SOC was near full, I shifted to N on the downslope to force friction pads for braking. Keeping it in D would cause the engine to come on after the battery was as full as allowed. I could have easily coasted at 55 MPH, and got 75 MPG coasting with the engine on, but knew in this case it would be advantageous to keep it under 40 MPH. ( speed limits on these rural roads were 35 to 45 MPH so pretty near perfect. )

BTW... this car runs better at 12,000 feet above sea-level, than sea level.
Sorry Gary.
You have to throw out your obsolete paradigms with this vehicle.
Hills / mountains will improve your gas mileage by leaps and bounds.
Just thought you all should know.
-John

Nice going. I assume the FEH has an mpg gauge. You should have taken a picture.

My only question - what mileage did you get climbing the hill?

Sorry to play devil's advocate, but how much battery did you use in this situation, and what about the driving afterwards? Did this drain the battery, or were you able to regen enough? If all of your battery expendatures were replaced with regen, this would be a great secret to reveal. Most of my current confusion relates to when to "L" drive it vs. "N".

As a newbie, I'm trying to figure out how much regen my car needs for every mile on EV. I know that the experienced hybriders in our group know more, and are sharing their data. Part of owning one of these cars is finding the 'happy medium' between using the ICE, the electric motor/battery and coasting in "N" (using nothing.)
I wanted to add this thought that I had after clicking POST. When I owned a full gas vehicle, I didn't concentrate on my driving as much as I do now. Although I'm a conservative driver by nature, the FEH info panel (without the NAV package) helps prod me into driving even better, and even into shifting in an automatic!


I agree that this is a phenomenal mpg! CONGRATS - It may be the first time an SUV broke into triple digits. But, as many owners, I'm more concerned about long term mpg.

30+mpg vs. 20+ mpg with a minimal decrease in cargo-room -- why should someone consider a nonhybrid?

He has a Scan Gauge. The highest MPG that shows on the FEH's navigation/energy management screen is 60 MPG I believe. I don't know about the highest MPG that displays in the message center for those who don't have the navigation system/energy mgmt. screen.

Here's my picture of my all-time best MPG (I'm still a newbie; purchased our FEH in March '06):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wildtexas/158188972/

- Shannon (Geeky, Wild Texan)

Do you all reset your mpg display after every fill up or the start of every trip? im just wonderin' cuz i never know how my tanks are going until it is time to fill up again. i only reset after oil changes, i feel like im getting more of a realistic average when i do.

Like I said, the triple digits section was with a lot of downhill.
I got about 26-30 MPG going uphill.
25% uphill, 25% downhill, 50% flat, total = 46.56 MPG.
I got a ScanGauge because like stated below, the Nav package only reads "max" above 60 MPG.

The SG also displays individual trip data, so you don't have to reset your built-in one.

In my opinion, everyone should hit the RESET button on their fuel economy displays at every gas fill up. A little known secret for most owners, ( but discussed elsewhere on this group ) is the built-in features of the car only hold about 2000 data points. In general, this means less than 3 tanks worth of gas.
If you never hit the reset button ever, you are looking at only your past 2-3 tanks, not totals. Sorry... and yes, this bugs most people, but there's nothing you can do about it! ( except buy something else, like a SG )

As far as battery use, USE AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!
Actually, on the 50 miles of downhill, I had so much regen, I could have charged a dozen battery packs. After my battery was full ( via Nav screen ) I had to shift to N and "waste" energy as heat with friction brakes.

It's hard for me to exceed 42 MPG continuous over the highway, at highway speeds, with no stops for EV driving. Driving in continuous highway conditions in the Mountains net me over 50 MPG for total round-trips time and time again.
While you cannot break laws of physics, Hills / mountains will always give you a net gain in MPG vs. flat driving. Most of our past thinking ( pre-hybrid ) would tell us to take the flattest route. This is FALSE in the hybrid age.

A flat route for 100 miles will net you say 35 MPG both ways.

An uphill route for 50 miles can net you 26 MPG uphill, and 126 MPG dowhill.

Which route uses the least amount of gas???

-John

*both routes assume you can drive 35-40 MPH.... above 40MPH, I do not think you can get 126 MPG... but who knows?

35-40 is not what I consider highway driving. I drive through the rolling hills here in CT everyday at true highway speeds (65MPH limit). I'm happy if I can average over 33MPG in that situation. For true highway speeds, I still think flat is better. (I don't have any of it though, so I may be wrong )

My 4WD
Wife's 4WD

Hi Scott

If you want flat roads, I've got flat roads here in So. FL. From what I can tell, a few short climbs can work to my advantage to boost MPG. It's those long climbs that can hurt MPG IMO. Like John said, down hill can waste alot of energy if its long. There's only so much storage the battery can hold.

Looking at John's mileage, I have a higher more consistant overall average because of my flat roads I think. I can increase speed slowly and glide in "N" and EV up over bridges and overpasses, and get regen and maintain speed on the way down.

Also, 46.56mpg is great for a long RT in the FEH, but I've nail down over 55mpg in that same amount of miles in my area. Of course, that is with no highway speeds.

There are many tricks to climb a good hill like "Driving With Load" (DWL) that can reduce the hit on a climb. Most of these tricks are common sense, but for details on this and other tips on pushing the envelope, see
http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/gloss...stglossary&c=1

Highway driving, and short highway driving in hills or flat roads will not make much difference because of wind resistance. Speeds above 50mph start affecting
MPG big time, see my Steady State Speed Test at:
http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=350

When I get time, I going to conduct the same test with the A/C on. It will be interesting to see how 50mph will compare to 60mph with the A/C.

GaryG

I reset after every fuel-up.

- Shannon (Geeky, Wild Texan)

NICE!!! I realize it takes some effort to push the FEH to get numbers like that. The best trip I got was 40MPG for about 30 miles (no hills, lots of coasting, and max speed of 49mph)

BUT for 1 mile from the gas station to my home I got 99.9 MPG (which someone in this thread asked what was the max a message display shows)

See pic

http://www.greenhybrid.com/share/fil...00423-copy.JPG

"He who laughs last is a slow thinker."