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marc a

Disapointing Fuel Economy

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This may sound cruel, but if you can trust the PPPRius owner, have him drive the car a bit and see what he can get.(granted of course he does well in his). A lot of this car depends on how it is driven and where it is driven.

 

A lot of the blame game goes towards the drivers on these, so dont be offended by it, it does take a lot to learn on these cars, they aren't very driver friendly, but once you get the knack in them, you will be surprised how easy it becomes and does transition into the non hybrids. Ford will always blame the driver, no matter what. Unless there is a hard set trouble code, they will state, no trouble found.

 

It is cruel because once the pppprius driver drives the FFH, you might not get it back. :) Ted gave a good run down of tips, and GrySql the links to the most helpful threads you will find. It is true, short trips under 10 miles will kill MPG. If you can, get a pic of your trip summary lifetime, and the coach screen, we might be able to give some insight with those.

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I guess I'm the exception.

 

El_Conde, some how I don't think the EPA is programming Ford's hybrid software. If that's what you think, you real need to do some research. If that was the case, they must be programming for the Prius, Tesla and the Ferrari. As for fraud. Nope. I believe the EPA disclaimer is "Your mileage may vary". You have an axe to grind. You say you have contacted Ford. Have you actually taken it to the dealer to see if there is a problem?

 

I guess I was the other exception, as the display on my 2013 FFH said 50.9 MPG when I sold the car at 35k miles -- I will corroborate El_Conde's point on the optimistic display average vs the manual calculation (I've noted this in various threads about a dozen times), as the display said 50.9 but the manual calculation over every fill-up across those 35k miles was 48.7, which is almost a 10% difference. However, over 128k miles when checking the same comparison on the Prius, it was about 6% off which is more accurate than the FFH but the EPA still couldn't manage to get the Prius programmed accurately either. So Toyota is a big fat fraud too.

 

And I myself had a trip on I-95 last weekend from VA to SC with the Energi (with 5 in car and bags Tetris-packed in trunk), on the way down set the cruise at 65 and got 42 MPG (EPA programmed mine for 43 so it was pretty close), and on the way back cruise was set on 68 and got 40 MPG which is still good.

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After driving Hybrids for 7 years, I knew going into the 2013 that I could expect to see 38-43 MPG in it on my daily drive. It is something I calculated in my head after driving 3 other Hybrids since 2007 over the same roads, 5 days a week. Knowing what they got, and what their EPA claims were is where I based my expectations on. Call me nuts or whatever, but when that "other" car failed to get even close, I knew it had an issue, but Ford put up the YMMV claim and told me to go pound sand. Since I would not take that as an answer I worked with my dealer(the service manager also believed there was a problem but his hands were tied), and got a replacement without going through legal issues. I can happily say I was right, the replacement Does get 38-43 MPG, exactly what I expected it to.

 

Its not 47 MPG as the EPA claims, but I also don't drive on EPA roads in EPA weather, at EPA speeds. None of the other 3 hybrids got EPA(well the Camry actually did better than EPA, it averaged 36 and EPA was 34, but thats because of how i drove it, I didnt trust the brakes). The Prius was rated 50 highway 60 city, I got 45 mostly. The 2010 FFH was rated 36 highway 41 city, and 39 combined, it got 38 Combined when winter was factored in. For the first year though it never saw 40 MPG, it wasnt until it hit 15K that I started to see 41 MPG in it.

 

You can get 47 MPG in these cars when driven under the right conditions, and driven correctly. There are stretches of roads that if I took every day to and from work I too would see what Sleddog and Jeffh see in theirs, because every time I take those roads I am seeing mid 50's. They are relatively flat with long stretches between lights with a 45 MPH speed limit, traffic flows at around 50 MPH for the most part. Ideal conditions for great gas mileage. Its the perfect EPA road setup.

 

So factor in 3 things here, the winter blend fuel, Road conditions, (pavement, grades, traffic, and weather), and your driving habits. All of these factor in to what the car will get in MPG. While you cant change 1 & 2 you can change the driving habits, and that is the most important part of driving a hybrid, its only going to be as good as it is driven.

 

As for the gauge discrepancy, already covered in another thread, yes its a known issue and is because of how the computer determines how gas is used. Also if you use remote start, it is not counted in fuel consumption.

Edited by acdii

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Jeff-h's math is a little off. 50.9 to 48.7 is about 4%, not 10%. That is the discrepancy in my 2010 FFH but my odometer reads 2% low so the net discrepancy is about 2%, about 1 mpg. The Prii have traditionally been about 6% too optimistic.

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Jeff-h's math is a little off. 50.9 to 48.7 is about 4%, not 10%. That is the discrepancy in my 2010 FFH but my odometer reads 2% low so the net discrepancy is about 2%, about 1 mpg. The Prii have traditionally been about 6% too optimistic.

 

Oops - You caught me fudging the numbers - or I was in a hurry and did a quick calc in my head and that's what fell out.

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