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Comments
If you accelerate around the city a lot, the state of charge goes down. Use less boost in town by driving more gently. For 5-speed, make sure that you do not depress the clutch until nearly stopped. The battery regeneration does not work with the clutch in.
The state of charge is important because when you hit the highway, the battery recharges during steady cruising. During the first many miles of cruising, while the battery is getting recharged, my instantaneous mpg indicator was steady around 30 or 40 mpg (I forget which). Once the battery was fully charged, my instantaneous mpg indicator went way up, reaching a lifetime average of 54 mpg by the time I finished my 134 miles.
Does anyone have any experiences in hilly parts of the country that are also chilly? I see alot of reports on performance in cold weather but not much about hilly regions.
Anyone with any experiences please let me know.
thanks
Jason
As for technique of driving, I drive more aggressively. I'm usually in the 3,200rpm range, going about 80mph. I usually get 38mpg when I drive like this. I can get 40-41mpg if I drive within speed limit or 5mph above it. It still seems far from some other people.
While my car hasn't had any problems, since my last scheduled maintenance, the steering wheel is a bit off. To drive straight, my steering wheel has to be slightly to the right. If I make the steering wheel level, then I start going to the left little by little. This is something I will mention on my next maintenance (at 11,800). I've already had 3 scheduled maintenances I believe.
I was driving last night on wide empty residential roads. There was a curve which was covered with ice. As I was driving on it, I felt my car sliding more and more to the outside of the curve. And so I pressed the brake slightly and the back of my car slid out and I was travelling sideways while my front sharply aimed toward the middle of the road. I had to quickly turn to the right to straighten myself. Then when I reached unfrozen ground, my car got grip again and lurched the other way around. I was going at approx. 30mph and it was scary. This leads me to my observation. I thought it was because I had low roll resistant tires, but you know what? I have dunlop sp20e or something like that, and when I parked today next to an older, regular civic, I saw it had the same exact tires. So I don't think I have "low roll resistant" tires. In a way, I'm glad cause the ice incident was scary and this tells me that I just have to be more careful on ice cause my tires are normal.
Finally, maybe it's because I've driven my car mainly around 3000rpm, the engine noise is a bit louder. The weird thing is, when I test drove the car, everything seemed super quiet. Now, I notice a lot of outside noise. I guess the insulation is not that great. But the engine is still quieter than most, especially when it warms up. Just louder than it was before.
I still love my car and while I keep thinking of other cars that could be options, I come to the same conclusion that I got the best car for me. There's no regret. I just hope that my car doesn't have any problems for the next couple of years.
Maybe it'll help if you guys all go and write your average mpg, location, and main gasoline company. Maybe we'll see a trend among the 30mpg people and the 50mpg people.
i have a hybrid cvt, just under 10k miles. last night the car started rough (1st time this has happened), and the engine malfunction indicator light came on. owners's manual says one cause is loose gas cap, so i removed and re-tightened the cap, went for short drive as advised by manual => light has remained on for past day and a half, but the rough start has disappeared and car seems to be operating normally.
have an appointment at dealer on monday, but in the meantime am curious if this has happened to anyone else, and if so, any possible remedies. nhtsa website has 2 TSB that sound related. anyone have any specifics on them?
thanks.
To those disappointed in their mileage, I submit that getting good mileage from your Hybrid is a learned experience. You have to sacrifice a little time in order to optimize your mileage. By letting the car coast a bit and by feathering the accelerator, you can get that mileage into the mid- to upper-40's.
I tried a higher octane name brand gas, and it didn't improve my mpg at all. Now I use the cheapest 87 octane I can find. I find that the hills in my town (steep), my driving style (coasting downhill is a learned but beautiful skill), and the cold weather (brrrr) have a greater effect on our still improving mileage than pricey gas. We've got almost 5,000 miles on the HCH, and started out getting 35.5 mpg. Now we're getting about 38.7 mpg, but it was up to 39.3 mpg before the cold hit. In fact, our best tank was 41.2 mpg after I'd filled up at a no-name gas station in Teaneck, NJ. I paid $1.34 per gallon. That's about 25 cents cheaper than locally. I think the better mileage on that tank was because most of it was used on flatter land than our usual driving. I can't wait until spring to start breaking 40 mpg on a regular basis. We love this car.
Minerva: 2003 HCH, CVT, blue, $19,700.
1. We live in Texas which has similar AC conditions to Florida. AC works very well. No problems. We leave climate control system in Auto at all times.
2. A loose gas cap will cause the light to come on, and can cause rough idle. Even though you put it back on, the light will stay on for a while, then eventually go off, if like many other cars. Had a similar thing happen with our Volvo V70. There is also a way to reset it using radio controls on some cars. You have to get info from dealer. Anyone else get that dealer info yet? You can also bring it to the dealer and have them reset. I have also been told that disconnecting the fuse to the ECU will also reset the light. The computer will then have to relearn info on driving habits, etc., but that doesn't take long.
3. Have had no paint chip problems. My wife scraped the bottom of the front ground effect by hitting a curb. I sanded it well and put on several layers of touchup paint. Has held fine and blended pretty well.
4. At 4400 miles we get 44.2 mpg overall on mostly flat terrain in Texas. Have noticed no difference with different gasolines, or different octane. We only saw about 1-2 mpg drop with AC.
The car has been completely flawless. We love the car. The other day I pulled up to a light in Dallas. A Hummer H2 pulls up next to me (with of course only the driver inside, no passengers). I thought how interesting it was to have the best and worst MPG vehicles side by side. Wonder if anyone noticed.
Most of my driving will be short hops around town, usually with only me in the car. My work is only about a mile from my home so I'll put maybe only 30-40 miles a week of in-town driving on the car, with an occasional 60 or 100 mile round trip to neighboring cities.
Which transmission would yield the greatest mpg? I live in Kentucky, so it's a little hilly and gets moderately cold in the winter. THanks!
we bought a civic hybrid some months ago, and we love it,but there's one problem. It doesn't get the gas millage it should be. We've gotten only around 35 mpg. That's less that the regular civic.Has anyone had this sorta millage?
The Honda Civic Hybrid CVT gets better city mileage than the manual according to EPA testing. That probably depends a whole lot on how you drive it. With my manual Civic Hybrid, I find I get about 40 mpg city, and 55 to 60 mpg freeway. Since I do about 80% freeway and 20% city, I get an overall average of about 51 mpg so far (685 miles).
I'm in Southern California, so temperatures have been moderate so far. A/C is never on, Econo switch is always on. In city driving I try to minimize boost and maximize deceleration coastdown charging in order to keep the state of charge up, but not to the point of annoying the hell out of the drivers behind me. Still, I'm getting only about 40 mpg in my city with moderate hills. Freeway uphills knock the hell out of the mileage, but most of that is recovered on the way back down.
> rough (1st time this has happened), and the engine malfunction
> indicator light came on.
Was the "rough start" actually the backup starter starting the car instead of the IMA? Was the IMA working when you started driving?
There have been several reports on the Yahoo! civic_hybrid group of something similar happening to CVTs, and there is apparently a software upgrade remedy. Check that group for details.
> this year....Most of my driving will be short
> hops around town....My work is only about a
> mile from my home...Which transmission would
> yield the greatest mpg?
I'd say it's a toss-up between the CVT and 5-speed. The CVT seems to do a little better with real in-town, stop-and-start driving; the 5-speed a little better with more 35 mph+ open road.
In your case, though, with only a one-mile commute, neither car is even going to get fully warmed up before you get there! So really neither one will reach its full mileage potential.
For this particular situation, you might want to check out the Toyota Prius, which has an electric-only "stealth mode" which you might possibly be able to use most of the way to work, depending on the speed of your roads, etc. Or if you really want to save gas, walk or bike the mile to work and keep the HCH in the garage for those longer trips!
>> operating unless the car is fully warmed up
That wouldn't be a limitation of the motor or battery-pack. My Prius favors the motor when I first start it up here in Minnesota. That allows the engine to warm up a bit before placing heavy demands on it.
JOHN http://john1701a.com
Here's a link to an EPA document which might be useful: http://www.epa.gov/otaq/rfgecon.htm
Sadly, the Civic Hybrid won't perform much better than a Prius on a one- or two-mile drive. It too needs to come up to temperature before things like Auto-Stop will happen.
If the vehicle you're looking for is to be driven on the short hops you describe, perhaps you could realistically consider an electric vehicle of some sort with a charging station at home.
I don't see any rational hybrid application here.
I live in a city and only drive 6,000-7,000 miles per year. I really regret having leased a new car in 2000. Luckily I can make up for it this coming July!
I'll be looking at late '90's Civic DX hatchbacks and only wishing for a Civic Hybrid...
I purchased this car for about $1,700 under the sticker price which, at that time, was $21,010. I live in a large metropolitan area and there are more than 30 Honda dealerships in the area. I used the internet to get the dealers to bargain with me. I started off visiting 4 dealers who I had contacted on the internet via email. I then sent an email to all 4 stating the best deal each offered. Within 24 hours, I got calls from 3 of the 4 dealers offering me better deals. I narrowed it down to 2 of the dealers when the third dropped out. I got 4 additional things added to the car at no extra costs, mudflaps, protective covering on the hood and the back of the side mirrors, wheel locks and floor mats.
I would say that 90 per cent of my driving is Highway driving. The lowest gas mileage I ever got was 41 mpg and that was on the first tank of gas.
Oh, my mileage doesn't really vary that much, when I use the air conditioning in the summer time.
So there's my 2 cents worth.
I have spent at least 12 nights that I can remember sleaping in that car. 4 of those were with two other people in it. Drop the back seat and put legs in the trunk. head on the back seat.
I've changed oil, spark-plugs, and I've put gas in it. That is it. I've talked to other people who have ECHOs. They have very simmilar results for fuel economy.
I have raced people off the stop lights many a times. I have raced people in their civics. If the civics are non-modified, and I have yet to loose. I have purposfully raced some frientds of mine and even when we swap cars my ECHO beats them. They in my car I in theirs and vice versia. The cars we were swapping were civic ex coupe with 5 speed manual! Actually i cannot remember a day that has passed that the car did not hit redline, not racing just acceleration on ramps, highways etc. The engine is barely audible.
Options I had on mine. Rear window deffoger, ac, power steering, very basic. I walked out of the door with taxes and everything 12.1G. I bought the car at 100 over invoice. It was if I am not mistaken in the low 11g's.
To summerize: I SEE NO POINT IN BUYING A HYBRID(7 G DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ECHO AND HYBRIDS ANY WAY YOU LOOK AT IT). HOW STUPID IS THAT. ECHO COSTS LESS, ACCELERATES BETTER, HAS VERY SIMILAR AMOUNT OF ROOM INSIDE, AND YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT THE BATTERIES.
People get a grip. Those cars are pointless. For that kind of money you could get a Jetta or a Golf tdi. Reliability for VW is not as good as Honda, much less Toyota, but the diesel will not break. Just the other small stuff, if that.
Yes, you missed the point.
Echo emits dirty emissions. The SMOG related exhaust (that's NOx & HC) is worse than any of the hybrids.
Plus, your MPG isn't as good. My Prius gets low 40's in the winter (here in Minnesota) and low 50's in the summer. At 45,395 miles my lifetime average is 45.0 MPG.
Also, the propulsion thrust provided by the motor does a great job to reduce strain on the engine. Engine maintenance should prove lower and the life longer. Motor maintenance should be almost non-existent, since there aren't even any brushes to wear out.
> ACCELERATES BETTER
Are you sure you were actually looking at the speedometer? Judging based on feel & RPM doesn't work in a hybrid.
> YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT THE BATTERIES.
What is there to worry about? The battery-pack in Prius is designed to last between 150,000 and 200,000 miles. Plus, it's covered by an 8 year / 100,000 mile warranty. Replacement years and years later won't be that big of a deal (or price) since Toyota is signing deals now to be able to build & sell 300,000 hybrid systems per year beginning in 2005. And the quality of the design has already proven great. The battery-pack survives both heat & cold wonderfully. (Personally, the extremes mine has been in were -13 F and 102 F. In both cases, performance wasn't impaired at all, even with the heater and A/C cranked.)
JOHN http://john1701a.com
Don't you come out about even on environmental impact and ahead on economy and performance if you compare a hybrid and something like a Civic HX or Toy Echo or even an Si - factoring in initial cost, resale, service, environmental impact of manufacture and batteries, etc?
The big hybrid joy seems to me to be in participating in a developing technology. That's not be underrated. For example, computer use was a great joy before there was any valid practical or economic justification.
the hybrid clearly has the upper hand during its road life, given zero emissions at traffic lights and stops in bumper-to-bumper traffic. and we all know that global warming is largely due to gas vehicles sitting at lights and in standstill traffic, when emissions peak. then, factor in gas mileage, which seems to vary widely on hybrids but still come in above gas-only equivalents. but i'm not sure what happens to a hybrid's battery once the car is scrapped/recycled.
anyone?
if the invention of hybrids is like most engineering marvels, the end-to-end impacts won't be assessed until after they're observed, which is unfortunate (witness many pharmaceutical drugs, hydropower, nuclear power, frankenfood, lead paint, asbestos, etc., etc.).
i love those diesel european city cars ;-)
For example, if a hybrid costs 5K$ more to buy, that means 5K$ more economic activity; and, depending on what that economic activity is by which I come with the extra $, the purchase of a hybrid could well entail a net loss to the environment. Suppose I earn the extra 5K$ with a gas powered lawn mower and leaf blower?
So, like I say, the economy and environmental agruments for hybrids may not carry; and the real benefit from hybrid ownership may well be in participating in the development of an emerging technology.
Consider, then, the fact that some emerging technologies don't develop.
regardless, given the same mileage as a hybrid, the hx would emit more ozone layer harming emissions. period. no question. no room for debate.
1. specific brand of fuel you use? if not, write any.
2. do you conciously monitor your mileage?
3. do you drive within speed limit?
4. what is the average city/highway speed you travel at.
Here are my answers:
1. used to be any, but get best mileage with Exxon Regular
2. usually don't monitor my mileage
3. usually over speed limit by at least 5mph
4. i usually travel 40mph/75mph
I think this would be very useful to see if any one of these would be a large factor in the mpg we get.
2. We have monitered our milege since the day we've bought it and it's never been above 40.
3.within 2-3mph of the speed limit.
4. 45/60mph
Hope that helps.
1. Total miles on your Civic Hybrid.
2. LIFETIME mileage (MPG) of the car (estimate OK).
3. Percentage city driving/percentage highway.
My answers:
1. 2000 miles
2. 36.8 MPG
3. 80/20 %
Thanks everybody, I think this will be interesting. From what I am able to gather, there is a general dissatisfaction with mileage in the Hybrid "community" (though the car itself is beautiful...)
48,500 miles
80% highway
Seriously, I regularly get 400-440 miles out of my 11.5 gallon tank. 15 miles to work on a 50 mph road.
The sticker where I bought promised 49 city/48 highway. So far, I am disappointed, hoping things will change. If I drive differently (weirdly, that is, a lot of coasting, I've gotten up to 46 mpg - still less than promised...)
My 96 Nissan 200SX got in the mid 30s regularly.
Civic hybrids are only a ulev while something like the nissan sentra is a partial zero emitions vehicle, and it's much cheaper.
total miles: about 5600
average mpg: 34
highway/city: 60/40
What are you basing that judgement on?
After 100 years, engine-only technology has peaked. That's as good as it gets. There's a tremendous amount of potential available in hybrids though, motor & battery technology is still very young.
My SULEV 5-person hybrid has delivered a 45 MPG average driving 46,000 miles in a northern climate (Minnesota). The traditional vehicles simply can't compete with that already. Imagine what the hybrid technology will be like a few years from now.
JOHN http://john1701a.com
Don Gillespie
Nahsville TN