My City MPG scored low (40)

So you rented a Prius and expect to get 51 MPG the first time you used it?

 

Over 4563 miles since new, my 2013 Prius C has taken 84.2 gallons of E10 gasoline for an average 54.2 MPG in normal suburban and highway driving. Almost half those miles were during the very cold and snowy Winter of 2013-2014. Driving in LA, I think the car should easily exceed the 53/46 EPA rating.

 

Insufficient detail, we need more info:

Fuel economy complaints/queries? Please copy, paste & answer these questions, esp. if you're new

It takes some time to get the nut behind the wheel fully tuned. I wouldn't expect that to be achieved with a rental.

When I was commuting, mpg varied drastically with season and weather and traffic conditions. This time of year, in dry weather with favorable traffic, I could get 72 to 76 mpg, over a 36 mile round trip (two cold starts) of 65 to 100% city conditions (depending on route selection, which varied according to the day's traffic reports), with a bit over 2000 feet of gross elevation climb. Zero net climb, of course, for the round trip.

More typical was high 60s in summer, 50s in winter. 80 should have been possible under ideal conditions, but those were even better days for bicycle commuting.

 

This is my current dashboard with a 25% freeway/75% urban-suburban mix.

 

Don't feel bad as I only got 39 MPG on my first, long distance, drive in our 2003 Prius:

I was driving from Fort Worth TX to Shreveport LA on I-20 headed East at Texas highway speed. When I topped off the tank, the 39 MPG made me briefly think about turning around and taking it back. But I realized if the EPA could get 45 MPG on the highway, I was at least as good of an engineer as any government bureaucrat and should get the same or better.

The next leg was at sundown so I set the cruise control to just over 60 mph and sure enough, got over 52 MPG. The rest of that 800 mile trip was broken into a series of 2-3 hour segments driven at different cruise control speeds and led to the graph showing a 'knee in the curve' around 70 mph. I even repeated the 75 mph segment, shorter this time, and got the same 39 MPG. So I recommend using 65 mph as the top, 2001-03 Prius highway speed to handle head-winds and grades. Note, I grew up when 60 mph was considered the fastest highway speed on often narrow, two-lane roads in Oklahoma.

Once I got back to Huntsville, I ran a series of week-long, cruise control managed tests using different routes. I learned about the issue of overfilling the 1.5L engine and drained an excess quart to get a significant MPG improvement. I also mapped the temperature impacts. In effect I learned that the Prius responds to experimental changes in driving technique in well defined and reproducible ways.

So I have done and continue to do a lot of Prius experiments confident that the results are reproducible. When I suggest 'try A' it is because I've done the A-B-A type testing in ways that anyone can follow. But it is critical these can be reproduced by anyone:

• cruise control - this means speed control is by computer that prevents 'fretting' the accelerator. Claiming "I saw XX mph" has not merit unless cruise control is used.
• shift "N" - instead of 'feathering' the accelerator, it is clear, unambiguous, and reproducible.
• "pulse and glide" - I only use the above techniques, cruise control and shifting into "N". With this reproducible protocol, I can see a 10-11% improvement but the speed range, 25-42 mph, is uncomfortable, especially in traffic.

If you like a mechanical puzzle, the Prius is a blast. If you only want to get from A-to-B and 'just drive', you'll be disappointed with the mileage. Sad to say, ordinary cars are not match the hidden secrets of the Prius.

Bob Wilson

 

See the DOE / EPA website Download Fuel Economy Data. For 2010, the Prius is listed with a City Unadjusted test result of 71.9537 MPG, before the empirical fudge factors are applied to produce the significantly lower Monroney Sticker numbers. I believe it, because I have done that well even with the handicaps of colds starts and substantial elevations changes:

No surprise, as I managed to met and beat the raw test results on my two prior non-hybrids too.

But not everyone gets the same results. Consumer Reports normally gets below-EPA results on nearly all cars.

And not everyone wants to get EPA results. They can easily flog the car, any car, into getting lower numbers. Prius floggers include Jeremy Clarkson, Green Human John, and plenty of test drivers for auto magazines catering to performance enthusiasts.

 

Yep.

OP needs to read Car and Driver: The Truth About EPA City / Highway MPG Estimates | PriusChat.

Nope. Monroney sticker figures were never meant as a promise of actual mileage on a road.

Tests are conducted on a dyno w/a strict schedule and mileage is derived from tailpipe emissions collected in bags. They don't even measure actual fuel usage.

See above link.

To quote from the article

The article also doesn't discuss the coastdown test: Coastdown Facts | Hyundai MPG Information. OP should also read these:
EPA Fuel Economy Ratings Background | Hyundai MPG Information
Hyundai/Kia Fuel Economy Background | Hyundai MPG Information

 

Yep. OP needs to answer the above.

 

Based upon what appears to be four local peaks in the EPA and fuelly histograms, patience and experimentation works best. It took me almost two months before I figured out everything what works for me in my daily 10 mile, city commute.

Bob Wilson

 

My drive is almost 0% city, but I do know that when I encounter stop & go traffic on the highway my mileage for that particular commute can vary between a personal worst and a personal best.

California may be different, but in Texas the typical driver is driving something bigger than me (thus preventing a good view of further ahead traffic flow) and they drive as fast as possible to the next bottleneck so they can come to a complete stop and text or apply make-up or whatever it is that's more important that paying attention to driving.

I try to basically keep up so that I don't get shot. Some days it works beautifully and I can consistently coast up right as the lead car is accelerating again. Other days I miss every time and have to total stop and immediately re-start. I can imagine that city driving would be similar to this...you will have good days and bad and it will be largely affected by the habits of those driving around you. 40mpg sounds like a bad day.

 

There are still ways to answer, it you really want to.

I posted that link very specifically because of the unanswered but essential items.

Assuming everything is right, without personally checking them, is a common neophyte mistake. The shop's interest in the matter is not identical to your interest.

That assumption also betrays a lack of monitoring of essential items, such as tire pressure, that must be monitored and maintained between shop visits.

 

I.e. you didn't read the list of what is checked to make it "Toyota certified".

A competent owner could check and report several things mentioned in the linked questionnaire.

 

Los Angeles is a big place, and many years have passed since the EPA based a drive cycle on some route in the city. Expecting any arbitrary route in the LA of today to match that EPA cycle is the stuff of idiots and trolls.

 

I saw Troy's now deleted post. He really needs to answer the questionnaire instead of dodging the questions.

Re: his claims, vs. his earlier Hondas, as a data point, from Nov 07, the Civic Hybrid that CR test back then got 26 mpg on CR's city test vs. Gen 2 Prius' 35 mpg: ConsumerReports.org - Most fuel-efficient cars. The Gen 3 Prius got 32 mpg on their city test: Most fuel-efficient cars.

And, as a reminder to others here, we only have a high level description of CR's test on the last page of Internet Archive Wayback Machine. Since they don't drive cars for FE and it seems the city test is very short (vs. ICE warmup time), it's not surprising city results for all non-plugin ICEVs, hybrids or not are pretty low.

 

I rented a 2nd generation Prius twice before buying a 3rd generation Prius... the first time I drove a 2nd gen Prius it was for only a weekend, and I got +40 mpg --which was sort of disappointing. Not to be dissuaded or discouraged too easily I rented a 2nd gen Prius on a second attempt. On the second attempt, I drove a 2nd gen Prius from Maryland to Michigan and got +50 mpg via the OH PA turnpike. Even when all the conditions are there, getting 50 mpg or better on a Prius in stop and go urban traffic requires driver skill. It took quite a bit of time and effort to learn how to do it - still even without trying a Prius Atkinson cycle motor can give diesel motor like fuel efficiency. After buying a 3rd gen Prius I struggled trying to get plus 50 mpg using just the HSI display - I finally started to improve my driving fuel efficiency once I started using a ScangaugeII meter/monitor which gave me better feedback as to what was the fuel efficient way of driving.

 

under your post the signature says prius g3 with lifetime mpg 68, is this the same car your talking about? I would suggest you drive the way you did to get the 68 lifetime mpg and tell us how you did it. acording to some of your other posts you have been driving hybrid cars for many years and this post seems to talk about stuff you already understand.