Problems...

If you have regular halogen headlamps, the bulb is an H4 style. If the new bulb went out a week later, and as they claim it "exploded," seems to me somebody at the dealership forgot to clean the bulb and got greasy fingerprints all over it.

With any replaceable halogen lamp, you must carefully clean the lamp capsule with isopropyl alcohol or acetone (Fingernail polish remover) before installation.

The minute smudge or oily residue can cause the lamp to overheat, possibly explode.

 

Exploding bulbs brings back a story about a month ago. The parts manager had spoke with a sales man who wanted to start supplying the bulbs for us. We had been using Wagner bulbs. So the sales man left a box of bulbs for us to try. Made in India. Personal experience,I put in 5 bulbs,3 exploded(2 before it got out the door), in 1 corolla! I finally got them to get me another Wagner bulb. Like they say,you get what you pay for. And yes you never touch the glass part when handling,will shorten life.

 

I only get around 43 MPG myself these days, but it's not the gas, merely my driving style. I go pretty speedily on the interstates (in LA) and make a pretty big number of very short trips, both of which are factors that contribute to a lower-than-expected mileage.

 

exploding bulb? is your headlamp leaking? water maybe? greasy fingers is a possibliity too, like Jayman said.

I get around 43mpg but i'm running 17" low profiles. I'm really thinking about switching back. It's killed my good reputation with fuel mileage. it's also costing me 80+ more Dollars a month in fuel.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(V8Cobrakid\";p=\"68958)</div>

I think that's a common complaint with those low profile tires. Even if the OD is the same (Eg Plus 1 or Plus 2 sized), the tires appear to have much higher rolling resistance.

Case in point was my former 2000 GMC Sierra 1500 4x4. The standard tire was a P245/75 16, but the salesguy talked me into P265/75 16 which is almost 1.5 inch taller OD. This is done at the factory so the speedo is ok.

He actually threw in the larger tire package during the order, which made me more suspicious. I specified 4.10 gears to compensate for the taller OD.

I noticed it was very hard to find replacement tires in that size, and just about impossible to find winter tires. So I switched back to P245/75 16, so at least I could find winter tires. Plus my fuel economy was sort of crappy, even allowing for a pickup.

With the P245 tires back on, and the PCM recalibrated to that tire size, I gained around 3 MPG city and 2 MPG highway. That's also with the 4.10 gears too.

So either a tire is too tall for the application, or the rolling resistance is too high.

I'm not into "performance" driving. I usually drive the speed limit or maybe 3-5 higher.

About the only time I regularly blow the doors off "performance" cars is in winter here when they're helplessly spinning their low-profile Performance tires on snow/ice and I buzz away on my Dunlop Graspic DS-2 winter tires. Gives me a lot of satisfaction.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(froSTed\";p=\"68680)</div>

Hi FroSTed,
Glad to see another poster from the Triangle here. Maybe your lower mileage is due to the cold snap we have had recently. Running the heater and defroster causes my Prius to take a noticable hit in mileage. Also, are you doing a lot of very short trips? Those too can be mileage killers.

- Bill in Durham

 

The ICE stumbling and shaking a bit when it shuts down seems to be a common occurence; it's been discussed at various places here on PC. If you think yours is excessive you might have your dealer look at it (Leith? Fred Anderson?)

 

The mechanics should know this, but when you replace these halagon bulbs, you should use a paper towel when taking the new bulb out of the box and put it right in the car socket so as not to get oil on it.