Did you recently take on (or consider) a loan of 84 months or longer on a car purchase?
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Only 1500 miles on Pilot when we left.
Set tires to 35 PSI and cruised at 75 most of the time.
Total miles -3180
Avg. MPG - 22.04
Best tank - 24.3 (next to last fill-up)
Worst tank - 19.6 (half city/half hiway)
I do not own a Pilot, but there are some things I do for any vehicle:
1. Use major name fuel with detergent cleansers. I use Mobil, Exxon, Shell, or Texaco exclusively, except in emergency situations.
2. I would wait until your tank is lower, so that you put in around 15-16 gallons. Putting in lower fuel amounts increases the chance that your math (miles/gallons) is skewed because of car position at the pumps, etc. The most accurate calculations are those with the largest numbers. $10 in gas represents only around 5 gallons! There is a good chance that you may be getting better MPG than you think.
3. Put as much PSI in your tires as you can, within the restrictions on the side of the tire (max cold pressure) and your own comfort level.
going: 280 miles/ averaged just over 25 mpg
returning via diff route/ averaged just under 25 mpg
I did drive easy - 65 on cruise whenever possible. Approx 100 miles (each way) was basically country roads, the rest interstate.
Will repeat this trip in several weeks, and will probably drive it hard, just for comparison purposes.
Tank 1: 378 miles, mostly secondary mountain/hilly road commuting: 20.3 mpg
Tank 2: 301 miles, same driving as tank 1: 21.0 mpg
Tank 3: 419 miles, mostly trip up and down I-91 in Vermont (mountainous/hilly) and some secondary roads: 23.7 mpg. We varied the speed up and down the mountainous sections, didn't use the cruise control.
Maybe it'll get better after break-in, but for now we're happy with it even though gas is what it costs. I calculated the mileage after applying a correction factor for the odometer: I found that while calibrating the odometer by using the mile posts along I-91, the odo was consistently about 2% fast (about 102 miles by the odo when we'd traveled 100 miles according to the mile posts). No big deal I suppose, but anyone know if the mile posts are typically correct on the interstates?
Returning, yet again another route (this time with an additional 50 miles of city lights) and cruise control frequently at 89'ish, I still got +22.5 mpg.
Occasionally, while following high speed traffic, I hit the century mark. Vehicle felt very stable, but my nerves weren't up to following them for too long.
Now, the flip side, my wife typically gets only in the high teens. She likes to be either on the gas, or on the brake. I try to drive as if I had no brakes, and try to anticipate traffic and allow the vehicle to maintain motion.
Thanks!
Thanks!
Just returned from a trip to Toronto, Canada. Got the best mpg out of the car, (current ODO 18216) 24.22 MPG. A/C was on all the way set to 72 degree full auto. (I maintained between 70 to 80 mph) Tires set to 32.5psi (original good year tires and regular gas)
GPS worked great even in Canada! I did not even need to print out any map quest even was driving around in Toronto.
I'm seeing all types of numbers on this message board.
I don't know if there is something wrong with this car.
May I have your thoughts.
May I have some input.
First of all let me apologize for forgetting to put in a subject line on my original email....should have read "EXL AWD mileage" or something like that. Instead, the subject line is my I.D.!?
To answer your question, yes, we are consistently getting 20+ mpg in the AWD. Here's our driving profile:
- Mostly 2 lane hilly/mountainous northern New Hampshire commuting/day trips (we're about 50 miles from the nearest interstate)
- Little use of the A/C so far; it's been pretty mild since we got the car in April
- We're pretty easy on the throttle, tend to drive conservatively, plus we rarely go over 55-60 mph on these roads
More recent mpg info:
On a 423 mile tankful, with just over 2000 miles on the odo, we got 24.7 mpg. This tank was mostly a day trip on US Rte 2 over to Maine, with maybe a hundred miles or so of daily commute mixed in. The 24.7 mpg figure includes the 2% odo error I mentioned in the original email; the odo is still about 2% fast. Again, we didn't use the A/C much.
I think the moderate speeds we're held down to on the two lane roads helps the mileage, but the hills probably cost us some mpg. Also, when winter hits and it gets around zero or + - 10 degrees, everybody's mileage will go down significantly around here.
By comparison, our beloved 99 CR-V AWD automatic, which our Pilot just replaced, got up to 27-28 mpg under similar road trip conditions. We drove the CR-V around here for most of its life....when we sold it this spring it had 85,000 miles on it, with the original brakes.
Anyway, hope this helps....we'll keep tracking our mpg especially since it's so expensive lately. feet2fire
Tires at 32 psi, oil at 5W20, 19.2K on the odo. I drove smoothly between 65 - 75 (GPS log shows a peak of 81 MPH). Mostly all open/level highway.
This is on an 05 Pilot EX AWD.
I keep hearing that's not a good practice since it can overtax your vapor recovery system and trigger the check engine light.
Steve, Host
On the July 4th weekend we went to San Antonio from Houston, 4 adults, 3 kids (the oldest kid, my 12-yr-old nephew, weighs about 150 lbs), A/C on all the time, and it got 22.27 m/g on about 70/30 hwy/local driving. The latest tank got me 19.5 m/g on about 50/50 hwy/local driving.
Not very good gas milage, but I am not too disappointed.
"Test #4 A/C On, Windows Up vs. A/C Off, Windows Down
Result: Nice in theory; not true in practice
Cold Hard Facts: No measurable difference (unless you open the sunroof, too!)
Recommendation: Please, make yourself comfortable."
Edmunds didn't test one vs. two A/Cs but the savings probably aren't going to be too great. But I rarely use the rear A/C in my minivan.
What Really Saves Gas? And How Much?
Steve, Host
tidester, host
I bought it new in Aug-05 and have put on a little more than 6,000 miles.
My 7-mile commute to work during off-peak hours takes me about 10-15 minutes. My return commute during peak-hour traffic takes me 25-35 minutes.
I use 87 octane gasoline; keep tire pressure at 32 psi and use the AC 75% of the time.
I love Hondas due to their great quality and high resale values.
Feel sad about my MPG :-((
Any comments would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Harry
The dealership gave it to me with full tank of gas but I didn't buy that, before I reset my mileage to zero I went to a gasoline station and fill it up and to my discovery it is lacking 1.6 gallon! Figure it out that might be the reason why you have a terrible mileage on your first full tank guys!! :P :P :P
I bought my Pilot EX 2wd last month.
First tank: 19.7mpg, 60/40 highway/city, A/C always on, in Houston hot weather.
Sceond tank: 20.7mpg, same condition as above;
Third tank: 20.8mpg, same condition as above.
On my truck, a Toyota Tacoma, sitting in the driveway, my truck will use 0.3 gph without the A/C and 0.6 gph with the A/C on full. If I change the rheostat while the A/C is on I can watch the gph change. Okay so that is sitting in the driveway
Here’s a comparison on the turnpike with the truck in cruise at 65 mph. GPH with A/C on at the warmest setting is 3.1gph or 20.97 mpg, and with the A/C on the coldest setting is 3.7 gph or 17.56 mpg. The change in gph is easy to see as you move the temperature rheostat from the coldest setting to the neutral.
When responding (if you do) please let me know if it is an aftermarket (Lund, Ventvisor, etc) or Honda's OEM shield. I'm debating getting a Ventvisor Bugflector II.
Thanks
Odie
Odie's Carspace
Easy to install, looks nice, and is durable.
Over all 4 windows are "VentShade" brand.
Mileage on this car has always been above average from what I'm reading here.
Kip
Each way is 7 miles, 3 stop signs, 4 traffic lights, 7 roads. Light traffic.
I bought it January 03 and it now has 21K on the odometer.
After pulling a light trailer the rear turn signals stopped working. (wiring defect in the trailer). When all was said and done the radio was asking for a code and the Driver Window "AUTO" did not work. Got those going but later noticed that mileage was down about 3MPG for both highway and commuting.
Read about and discussed with others and finally did the "IDLE Learn Procedure" . Mileage went back up, and then some.
Commuting = 17-18 mpg.
Highway trips (2 people)
24-25 at 80mph (AC as needed and Cruise on)
25-27 at 70 mph ( same as above)
28+ at 60-65mph (limited AC and not using Cruise)
Our 03 4wd automatic CR-V gets 3-4 better locally and 2-3 better on road trips.
Kip
odie6l
That Bug Deflector II is also a VentShade Product.
Kip
Something is wrong with your vehicle with mileage this low. Pilot is a lot lighter and smaller vehicle than my truck.
I am in the same boat as you. We just bought a 2006 Honda Pilot 4wd EXL and on our 1st tank which was combined city/30% and Highway/70% we got 17.5mpg, 2nd tank same breakdown 17.8mpg, 3rd tank mostly in town 13.2mpg. I don't know whether to think other posters are exaggerating their mileage or something is wrong with my new Pilot. We live in the desert and this time of the year we don't drive around the block without the air on. We have just over 500 miles on the odometer. It would be kind of nice if we could get somewhere near the EPA estimated mileage that was on the sticker. My 2003 Chevy Silverado 2500HD 2wd with 6.0Ltr V8 averages about 12.5 in town with a/c on but the Honda is much more pleasant to drive.
Odie
Odie's Carspace
It got good mileage from the 1st tank. Then fell off to 14-22 mpg after the battery got disconnected.
I heard about, studied, and then did the Idle Learn Procedure which is part of Honda dealer's GET READY PROCEDURE.
Great mileage returned !
Some of the Idle Learn Procedures are not done at the dealers correctly or they are not done at all. The result is poor mileage to the owner and the dealer telling you to put a couple thousand miles of poor mileage on your car to break it in. Breaking it in is not going to "Fix" the problem.
The ILP takes very few minutes for the average person to do. All you need is a small adjustable or 10mm wrench to momentarily remove the negative battery cable before doing the procedure.
Kip
I'm placing calls to Jeep today to see where that price comes in. It comes with everything and the accessories are less - trade off amenities for reputation?