who has the highest mpg dd?

I LOVE my TDI for commuter duty. It's super easy to get better than 50mpg hwy mileage. I'd recommend one to anyone who commutes long distances. I've put 60k miles on mine over two years, and have been offered the same price I bought it for!

1988RedT2 wrote: My '85 Chevy C30 Dooley gets 10 mpg if I keep my foot out of it. Fortunately not my DD. The MPV gets about 22 in a mix of highway and in-town. </blockquo I know two guys with much newer 1 ton duallys that arent doing much better (and huge truck payments to).

Another TDI owner here. Lifetime 46.88 MPG over ~10 years and 313K miles, purchased new in 5/03. The first few years the average was in the low-mid 40's, but over the past few years it's been consistently in the upper 40's and low 50's, so the lifetime average has been creeping up.

I've tracked everything I've done and spent on the car. 6,680 gallons of diesel at a cost of $19,160. Total cost (purchase, insurance, maintenance, etc) over 10 years: $62,612 with a lifetime average of 20 cents/mile (typically around 13 cents since the purchase loan was paid off)

I would love to say 30 city and 51 highway in my 91 Escort but with only 2 or 3 highway trips a year I have been told my samples are not sufficient!

I do get 29.9 mpg delivering pizza! 0-45mph blasts and back to zero again. Would love to be able to say 30 mpg but the facts are what they are. Oh, 378,000 miles on this wee beastie too!

I would like to note that after setting up my brothers 1970 Mustang convertible with an overdrive 5 speed and tall gears, he got 28 mpg from Texas to South Carolina and back...with AC! Next summer he is going from Texas to Vegas, Vegas to Charleston and back home again!

Bruce

Nice Volt! If I could have afforded one I would have bought one. It so hard to justify with my tdi was 21k out the door and gets high 40s. That price jump to the Volt is a lot of diesel

1999 Chevrolet Corvette. 17 mpg around town, 30 on the highway.
2001 Honda RC51, 29 mpg around town, 29 mpg highway, 34 mpg riding like it was due back half an hour ago.
1986 Homo Sapiens (m). About 15 miles to the gallon, but Crystal Light is cheap.

That's awesome, I can't wait for the tech in the volt to trickle down to something I could afford.

crankwalk wrote: Nice Volt! If I could have afforded one I would have bought one. It so hard to justify with my tdi was 21k out the door and gets high 40s. That price jump to the Volt is a lot of diesel

Actualy the price jump to the Volt isn't that much with all the incentives. Basically, I leased a $27k car, even thoguh it listed at $41k. At $27k financed, it becomes very competetive with other cars in it's class, as you don't have gas to pay for anymore.

Hard to compete against a vehicle that GM loses money on.

I drive an economy hatchback that struggles to achieve 28mpg..

I hate my Mazda3...

I've been tracking my daily driver 2012 Mazda 3 2.5/6MT (not the Skyactiv one) for the past 193 days. Best mileage per tank so far that I've tracked is 29.25mpg (a few weeks ago), and the worst was 23.31 (that was on snows and in the middle of a blizzard and more snow storms). Before I installed the app that I'm using to track this, I did get over 31mpg out of a tank. Lifetime tracked average is 27.38 so far.

I do wish that the car got better mileage, but coming from a 2009 WRX that struggled to get 23mpg on 93 octane when lightfooting it around, I'm fine with it. I do wish it had a bigger tank though, because I drive over 80 miles round trip a day.

If I can resist the urges I've been having to break down and get a V8-powered monster for my next DD, I think I'll be getting a Skyactiv Diesel Mazda 6. Those should get over 40mpg and have an insane fuel range while still being fun to drive.

DaveEstey wrote: Hard to compete against a vehicle that GM loses money on.

EVERY new vehicle loses money for the parent company for a while, until tooling and R&D is paid for. Every article so far on teh Volt forgets that, adn places teh cost to build erach one at an amount that INCLUDES tooling and R&D up to this point, not merely the cost to build the car itself (which is under the amount that they charge for the car, just like any other car).

Yeah, the range of a TDi is nice. I usually get around 700 miles to a tank in normal commuting. That was always the eye opener when I had to drive the gas cars for sn extended period - filling the tank every three days.

Ian F wrote: Yeah, the range of a TDi is nice. I usually get around 700 miles to a tank in normal commuting. That was always the eye opener when I had to drive the gas cars for sn extended period - filling the tank every three days.

Yeah, the range is amazing. My 99 golf went from CT. to MI. on one tank. 722 miles on one tank blew my mind. I get almost 50 mpg without even trying.

That's the other reason I want to hit 45mpg in the mx6. 712 mile range would be nice.

Ian F wrote: Yeah, the range of a TDi is nice. I usually get around 700 miles to a tank in normal commuting. That was always the eye opener when I had to drive the gas cars for sn extended period - filling the tank every three days.

I wish I had a tank big enough like a B4 Passat wagon to get over 1k miles to a tank.

crankwalk wrote:

Ian F wrote: Yeah, the range of a TDi is nice. I usually get around 700 miles to a tank in normal commuting. That was always the eye opener when I had to drive the gas cars for sn extended period - filling the tank every three days.

I wish I had a tank big enough like a B4 Passat wagon to get over 1k miles to a tank.

Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

Chris_V wrote: Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

But time is money. So, if I can not spend 30 minutes of pure frustration of lazy me first people, lazy attendants inside, big rig nozzles, etc..., additional per week/biweekly/monthly not pumping fuel in, win. There is more to fuel capacity onboard then pure numbers.

SilverFleet wrote: I've been tracking my daily driver 2012 Mazda 3 2.5/6MT (not the Skyactiv one) for the past 193 days. Best mileage per tank so far that I've tracked is 29.25mpg (a few weeks ago), and the worst was 23.31 (that was on snows and in the middle of a blizzard and more snow storms). Before I installed the app that I'm using to track this, I did get over 31mpg out of a tank. Lifetime tracked average is 27.38 so far. I do wish that the car got better mileage...

This is consistent with our experience with my wife's 2010 Mazda 3 with the same engine and trans. I was surprised they didn't make 6th a bit taller, since the engine had sufficient torque to easily accelerate the car uphill in 6th at 40 mph. For my wife, the deal breaker was the road noise. The gas mileage was just a disappointment. I really liked driving the car. My wife, not so much.

Ranger50 wrote:

Chris_V wrote: Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

But time is money. So, if I can not spend 30 minutes of pure frustration of lazy me first people, lazy attendants inside, big rig nozzles, etc..., additional per week/biweekly/monthly not pumping fuel in, win. There is more to fuel capacity onboard then pure numbers.

Exactly. I have a 7 miles commute. I can fill up once every 3 weeks. I'd love to fill up once a month or longer and also have great range for the long road trips I take.

Ranger50 wrote:

Chris_V wrote: Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

But time is money. So, if I can not spend 30 minutes of pure frustration of lazy me first people, lazy attendants inside, big rig nozzles, etc..., additional per week/biweekly/monthly not pumping fuel in, win. There is more to fuel capacity onboard then pure numbers.

Granted, truck stops can suck. One of the reasons I got the Volt is I can go months without seeing a gas pump if I wanted to.

crankwalk wrote:

Ranger50 wrote:

Chris_V wrote: Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

But time is money. So, if I can not spend 30 minutes of pure frustration of lazy me first people, lazy attendants inside, big rig nozzles, etc..., additional per week/biweekly/monthly not pumping fuel in, win. There is more to fuel capacity onboard then pure numbers.

Exactly. I have a 7 miles commute. I can fill up once every 3 weeks. I'd love to fill up once a month or longer and also have great range for the long road trips I take.

Yup, my daily commute is 25 miles round trip, a plug in hybrid would be fantastic if I could run on strictly electric around town and only use gas if I go on longer trips.

Chris_V wrote: Big tanks just cost more to fill up when you finally do fill up. Even if you can go farther on the tank, you're not getting better fuel mileage and you're still spending the same per gallon.

I understood that very well when driving my Cummins. I could get 600 miles to a tank with that truck, but filling it would cost over $120 if I let it go that long, so I usually topped it off at around half a tank. Except the fuel gauge didn't work, so I was usually guessing at about 300 miles.

Filling the TDi is about $50 these days, a little less than once a week (~13 gal tank).