my Hyundai advertises 40mpg, with the ECO on and if i keep my foot out of it, it does just about 40mpg...
Posted on 04/28/2012 12:06:31 PM PDT by Olog-hai
There are lies, damn lies, statistics—and official EU car fuel consumption figures. I and others have been banging on about this for years; the figures quoted by manufacturers in their ads usually (but, interestingly not always) bears absolutely no relation whatsoever to what happens in the real world. …
To get those “official” figures, new cars are subjected to something called the “New European Driving Cycle”, a series of short runs on a “rolling road” where the car is accelerated, put on a short cruise and decelerated under laboratory conditions. All the car makers have to put their cars through the same test, so on this level, there is no trickery involved. The idea is that the EU has created a level playing field upon which the performance of all cars can be judged.
But it is not as simple as that. Because this is where it gets clever, and some trickery DOES creep in. Some years ago, manufacturers realized that to score well on the official tests, they could tune their engines for maximum efficiency on the rolling road cycle. This was particularly the case for small turbocharged diesel or petrol engines and hybrids. For instance, the engine could be set up so that the turbocharger simply does not kick in during the cycle. But take the car out onto a real road and to get the thing to move at all, the turbo will be needed, massively increasing consumption. …
(Excerpt) Read more at hanlonblog.dailymail.co.uk ...
In america, cars get better mileage than the official numbers. I think this is because they test it with the AC running nowdays. It was one of the gimmicks the government came up with to force cars to get better mileage without changing the official CAFE requirements.
Werner Karl Heisenberg figured this out quite a while ago.
In the past, I found real world US mileage figures to be overestimated for automatics and underestimated for manuals (coasting is illegal though - I’d NEVER do that).
>>In america, cars get better mileage than the official numbers.
You must be that slow guy in front of me! LOL. My car doesn’t even get close to the EPA mileage.
Ethanol was designed by GOD for personal internal combustion, not to be used for getting somewhere.
Not surprising. Ethanol (76,100 BTU/gallon) doesn’t compare favorably with gasoline (114,100 BTU/gallon).
All i know is the wife and I went 3-4 years with only one vehicle since my work was so close to home. Got a new job a few months ago that is about 50 miles away. With gas prices and distance we decided to get a prius. No regrets they advertise 48/49 mpg. I’m averaging 52-56 depending on how quickly I accelerate - which is usually based on traffic at the time. With prices the way the are I couldn’t be happier.
Oh and we saved on insurance during those 3-4 years and put all that money back and scrimped and saved in other places rather then spending it. We paid flat for the car up front - no loans to worry about or be held over our heads.
my Hyundai advertises 40mpg, with the ECO on and if i keep my foot out of it, it does just about 40mpg...
Way to go! Screw Zer0 and The Goldman Sack.
Thank you Jesus for having our government regulate the shiite of these cheaters!
Hmm. They must run these tests at idle then, because the turbo these days kicks in very early - ~1500rpm or so. With VTG turbos etc. the days of "turbo lag" are long gone. Sounds like more BS "journalism". On the open road my Audi A4 quattro with the 2 liter turbo gasoline (200 hp) engine is close enough to what Audi states. And any sane person knows that stated figures are always a bit optimistic vs. actually driving in traffic. (I can get even better mpg than stated, but that takes the fun out of driving...)
Full sized 60s pre-smog cars got much better mileage than today’s hightech econoboxes.
The turbo doesn’t have to start charging at all; it can be bypassed, even. It’s not like a supercharger that’s belt-driven or chain driven or operated by the engine via other means.
Only in $/mi based on gasoline prices.
S/C’s can be bypassed too. Besides, with a clutch of some type on the front, they can easily be not driven at all, if desired.
Gets even easier to do in the case of computer-driven superchargers and turbochargers.
Hmmm...
http://www.motortrend.com/features/consumer/112_1001_1960_car_of_the_year/
1960 Corvair: around 20 mpg, 0-60mph in just over 21 seconds.
2009 Corolla: around 30 mpg, 0-60mph in less than 9 seconds.
Sure, but fix the excess camber on the Corvair and get up to 20.1.
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