25.5 mpg?

[Billinak]

I've been reading up on this forum about how to get the best MPGs and some claim there is a break in period and that mileage increases as you drive more, and that short trips impact MPGs. I have a 2009 Prius with about 200 miles on it, I start slow, accelerate slowly, and take mostly short trips about 5 miles or less. Has anyone else seen MPGs this low on a new car? How much can I reasonably expect it to increase? Thanks.

[Politburo]

If you don't change your trip patterns or your locale, you shouldn't expect it to change. The Prius does the worst on short trips in cold weather.

Edit: An engine block heater could do wonders for you. I don't use one, but many others here do and can provide more insight

[Matt Herring]

Originally Posted by Billinak

I've been reading up on this forum about how to get the best MPGs and some claim there is a break in period and that mileage increases as you drive more, and that short trips impact MPGs. I have a 2009 Prius with about 200 miles on it, I start slow, accelerate slowly, and take mostly short trips about 5 miles or less. Has anyone else seen MPGs this low on a new car? How much can I reasonably expect it to increase? Thanks.

You are a prime candidate for an engine block heater as your avg. temps never get above 65 degrees all year and your winters are frigid. Those short trips you take never give the car enough time to get out of the start up cycle and past warm up temp (and into EV mode capability) before you nearly reach your destination.

I'd do two things right away:
#1 Take a trip to the local auto store and buy an engine block heater...starting with a base of under 30 mpg you will see a nice increase in mpg and in the winter it's value will be even more for useful for you.

#2 Take a trip to your local hardware store and pick up some pipe foam insulation and insert it in your grill area to create a grill block (I attached a couple pics of what mine looks like). This will capture any heat the engine creates and help to heat the ICE up even quicker. Your temps are never that high so you can run a full or nearly full grill block year round (hotter days you might want to remove it). You can barely tell the material is in your grill if you are worried about aesthetics and it's easy to install.

I'll also suggest to you using pulse and glide and neutral coast to raise your avg. mpg. I have a 1/4 mile stretch of winding roads (with speed bumps) to get out of my living community and pulsing up to about 25 mph and then neutral coast has dramatically helped me maximize my first 5 min warm up mpg. If you have longer stretches than me then a regular pulse and glide will suffice.

[Billinak]

Thanks Matt, it's been summer here the last few weeks and we're almost up to 70 degrees! I have an engine block heater on my Subaru that I use in winter. So what you're saying is that using the heater all year will improve my MPGs? I guess that makes sense, the ICE starts almost immediately when I hit the POWER button, probably because it's too cold, but it's unfortunate that I'll essentially be trading electricy for MPGs all year round. The pipe insulation looks like an easy fix too. It's just a little disheartening as we saved for this car for years and now realize we could have gottne better MPGs with a diesel or some other regular car. Thanks for the info.

[richard schumacher]

The engine also starts to heat up the catalytic converter, not only itself.

Try accelerating harder. You want to keep the engine running near full load whenever it is running. Just ticking over is the least efficient mode for an internal combustion engine. If most traffic passes you when leaving a stop then you need to press harder. More gas, less brake.

Inflate tires to 42/40 PSI front/rear.

Do not use "B" in normal driving. It should be used only as an alternative to riding the brakes when coming down very long downgrades.

I suspect that most MPG improvements seen after a "break in period" have more to do with breaking in the driver than the car.

What car would give better MPGs under your conditions?

[Billinak]

I'll have to accelerate a bit harder from now on. As far as better mileage, I have several friends with diesel VWs who get in the mid 30's. Compared to what I'm getting right now, that looks pretty good. Based on more reading at this forum, it looks like there are several things I can do to improve my MPGs but that many drivers find increased MPGs as the vehicle is broken in, so hopefully my next post will be in the happy 40 mpg range, but my only hope is to move further away from my job and for global warming to catch up with us here in AK.

[Matt Herring]

Originally Posted by Billinak

I'll have to accelerate a bit harder from now on. As far as better mileage, I have several friends with diesel VWs who get in the mid 30's. Compared to what I'm getting right now, that looks pretty good. Based on more reading at this forum, it looks like there are several things I can do to improve my MPGs but that many drivers find increased MPGs as the vehicle is broken in, so hopefully my next post will be in the happy 40 mpg range, but my only hope is to move further away from my job and for global warming to catch up with us here in AK.

Don't get discouraged as you have difficult driving conditions to get max mpg. With the block heater and increased mpg's due to it's use you are actually saving more money in the cost of gas than you are in electricity to run it. If you have a kilowatt guage you can calculate the cost of your EBH vs. increased mpg's in the Prius (something that is recommended to make sure it is worth it for you to run the EBH...but I'm sure it favors the mpg in the Prius in terms of energy use).

The breaking in of the vehicle in terms of increased mpg will pale in comparison to what the block heater, grill block and improved driving skills will produce for you. While it's nice for the car to get broken in it's kind of like planning on getting better at a sport simply by playing games without practicing...there's alot of mpg's to be had out there...you just have to go get them.

Pay attention to your car and when/if you can get into EV mode on your commute. While moderate acceleration is good from a dead stop if you are up to temp and can get into EV mode...light acceleration will keep you in EV mode and pulling max mpg's. Hard acceleration when up to temp will pop you out of EV mode and trigger the ICE...listen to your car.

Best of luck!

[Billinak]

Thanks for the tips! Biking to work is easy in the summer time but gets harder in the winter (though my wife doesn't seem to have a problem biking at
-10) so hopefully by then I will have gotten a block heater and gotten used to the car enough to be happy with the MPGs. Thanks again.

[JimboK]

I agree that the short trips are likely the biggest cause of your poor results, especially if they are at highway speeds. Are you driving at or near those speeds?

This will give you other ideas. (I'm surprised no one has suggested that thread yet.)

I also agree with those who recommend a block heater. For short trips, it may be the single best thing you can do to improve fuel economy. I doubt your local auto parts store has it, at least not the Toyota heater. It's an OEM item, sold by Toyota Canada. I don't know if Alaska dealers stock it (I would think they would), but if not you can get it here. FWIW, I use mine year-round here in the mid-Atlantic.

I don't agree that accelerating faster will help significantly. If it does, the effect likely is small, and you have to be careful to avoid accelerating too fast; that will hurt fuel economy. Just be careful to accelerate fast enough that the ICE lights; battery-only acceleration unquestionably also will hurt fuel economy. Richard is correct in theory, of course, that an engine under load is more efficient than one that's not. But a few of us with added instrumentation have shown that the Prius engine is under load at a surprisingly low RPM, one that comes with the gentlest of acceleration rates. My own results with those rates are at least as good as those with faster acceleration. See this for more, especially post #45 where I discuss the gentle acceleration rates.

[Matt Herring]

Originally Posted by JimboK

I agree that the short trips are likely the biggest cause of your poor results, especially if they are at highway speeds. Are you driving at or near those speeds?

This will give you other ideas. (I'm surprised no one has suggested that thread yet.)

I also agree with those who recommend a block heater. For short trips, it may be the single best thing you can do to improve fuel economy. I doubt your local auto parts store has it, at least not the Toyota heater. It's an OEM item, sold by Toyota Canada. I don't know if Alaska dealers stock it (I would think they would), but if not you can get it here. FWIW, I use mine year-round here in the mid-Atlantic.

I don't agree that accelerating faster will help significantly. If it does, the effect likely is small, and you have to be careful to avoid accelerating too fast; that will hurt fuel economy. Just be careful to accelerate fast enough that the ICE lights; battery-only acceleration unquestionably also will hurt fuel economy. Richard is correct in theory, of course, that an engine under load is more efficient than one that's not. But a few of us with added instrumentation have shown that the Prius engine is under load at a surprisingly low RPM, one that comes with the gentlest of acceleration rates. My own results with those rates are at least as good as those with faster acceleration. See this for more, especially post #45 where I discuss the gentle acceleration rates.

Why do you say that battery only acceleration hurts FE? Are you talking about gently accelerating from a dead stop and staying in EV mode up to speed when you say that is not good for FE or are you describing something else? Just wondering because I routinely gradually get up to speed from a dead stop using EV mode only and both my SGII and my MFD continue to raise mpg the whole way.