2/09/2010

Mileage - What's yours?

Posted by with 4 comments | in
When buying a new/used car, often one of the first questions people ask is 'how good is the mileage' - meaning how many km's (or miles) can I drive per liter (or gallon) of fuel.

I've done a lot of driving over the last while, so I thought I'd explore this question a bit.

I currently drive a 1997 Mazda Protege, and according to CarsDirect.com - I should get between 20-25MPG (miles per gallon) in the city, and between 32-37 MPG on the highway.

Here is a summary of my calculations:

*note
1 km = 0.621371 miles
1 liter = 0.264172 US gallons

I'm actually quite surprised!  When I was doing more city driving my MPG was 25 and 26, when I drove from one city to another (3 hours on the highway) my MPG was 33.  It seems like my city driving is great, but I could improve my highway driving mileage.

Here are some tips to improve your fuel economy:

  • Don't speed
    • speeding as well as rapid acceleration and braking wastes gas.
  • Remove excess weight from your vehicle
    •  An extra 100 pounds in your vehicle could reduce your MPG by up to 2 percent
  • Avoid excess idling
    • Idling gets 0 miles per gallon. Cars with larger engines typically waste more gas at idle than do cars with smaller engines.
Do you know what your mileage is?

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4 comments:

  1. Girl Makes Cents9 February 2010 at 06:48

    Ah this is a good question, and I really don't know. I'm sure seasons make a difference as well. I idle much more in the winter warming up my car than I do in the summer. I should really calculate my mileage.

    I'm driving my parents vehicle while they are on vacation, so when I get mine back I will look into this!

    ReplyDelete
  2. RainyDaySaver9 February 2010 at 13:01

    Don't forget to keep your tires properly inflated, particularly in the winter when it's cold! That helps improve your mileage. One thing I've noticed, though is that MPG tends to be on the lower side of what's quoted, because the higher numbers come from near-perfect conditions. I get 25-27 MPG per tank of gas because I mostly drive on the highways, which is good for my 6-cylinder car, a Pontiac Grand Am.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jessie9 February 2010 at 14:07

    Great tip Rainy!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown10 February 2010 at 12:13

    With a Ford Focus I'm supposed to get 25-28 MPG in the City and 31-36 mpg on the Highway.
    I've tracked my mileage for a couple weeks now and get around 34-36mpg. I drive mostly on the highways and lately pretty fast.
    I once tested my theory of driving 60mph to get more mileage and it worked wonders. Usually I get about 320 miles out of one filling, when I drove slower, I got whopping 380!
    It's just the German in me that wants go faaaaast :)

    ReplyDelete

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