MPG gets better ... now 23 MPG

[ayap888]

Just refilled my tank. Did 267 miles and used up 11.6 gallons when I refilled. This translates to 23.01 MPG (actual MPG). NC - VA Beach - NC. I now have more than 1,500 miles on my odometer.

My last trip was 21.6 MPG.

The first 500 miles was 21.07 MPG.

It's getting better!

......April 26, 2009 (New Update)

Just went from Orlando FL to North Carolina (638 mile trip) ... and I was able to do 24.6 MPG. I placed full tank when I left my vacation resort in Orlando. Then, 455 miles later, I reloaded to full tank with 18.5 gallons. So actual MPG was 24.6 MPG. Speed was 70 - 80 MPH ... and occasionally I went 90-100 MPH overtaking some. Passenger was my wife and myself. And we had a good amount of luggage (had to lower the seats).
Modified by ayap888 at 8:44 PM 4/26/2009

[gloa2000]

Its good to hear, but lets go for 24 mpg! thats what we want!

[pronse]

Actually, I think this vehicle can get 26 MPG if driven on cruise.

Try to drive it with smart cruise on, "Info" being set to Fuel and watch the bars as you drive.

PS: Of course, we are talking about highway miles.

I got 22 miles for two hours of highway drive. I will try it again this weekend and see.

P.

[302@12psi]

I've gotten just below 24 on a 3 hour trip back from the mountains....I'm hoping to see 26 out of atleast one of my trips.

Average speed home from the mountains was 78. I'm sure if I drop speed down I can hit the 26 mark.

EX35 in AWD.

[M45Caliber]

just got back from a Ski trip -- Phoenix, AZ to Salt Lake City, UT and back. Calculated the total miles and total gallons used (filled it when leaving and upon return) and we averaged 25.8 MPG for the trip. Speeds were (depending on the road and posted limits) 50 to 80 mph. Mostly highway and rural roads. Maybe 10% city, if that. This is a RWD EX35 -- not the AWD. Amazing mileage given the HP and weight of this vehicle. We're pleased with it.

Oh -- there are now 14K miles on it; we bought it last Feb., when they first came out. So it's fully broken in and this is probably as good as it's going to get, mileage-wise.

Other than the fuel pump issue, NO Problems what-so-ever. This thing rocks. I'd still rather drive my M45, but this crossover/wagon/whatever is a pretty tight handler for sure. And more "solid" feeling that my '03 M. Huge difference in the torsional rigidity.

Reminds me of my dads 72 Mercedes 300 SEL with the 6.3 liter V8 ; which had doors from a bank vault -- the EX has that same solidity I remember that beast having.

[BrokenTiller]

First BIG road trip in the EX. Toronto to Naples Florida and back for March break with my wife and high school age daughters.

Tracked the fuel consumption with the trip computer and averaged just under 11 litres/100km (approx 22 mpg for our American friends) for the round trip of over 5000 km. AWD EX with a family of four on board and a Yakima Skybox Pro on the roof to add extra storage and drag. Almost all highway driving at 70-80 mph with the cruise control on 80% of the time.

BTW: The roof box worked really well and kept the car fairly uncluttered. Satellite radio and Starbucks kept my sanity as we drove 12- 14 hours/day. The car is quite comfortable but the driver seat in my Saab 9-5 is more comfortable for the loooong ride.

Modified by BrokenTiller at 6:27 PM 3/28/2009
Modified by BrokenTiller at 6:27 PM 3/28/2009

[gbear]

Took a 520 mile trip in Texas this weekend in my RWD EX with about 5000 miles on it. The mileage for the entire trip was 26.1 using cruise control set at 75 mph. This is almost 3 mpg better than my previous 2007 G35 got for the same trip. I am thrilled with that kind of mileage with an EX's performance.

[CaribMon71]

I think that a more accurate indication of the vehicle's actual mileage is its long term consumption. I really don't drive my EX 35 hard, and I think most of my driving is closer to freeway driving, but I still can't get much above about 17mpg over the course of several months of driving.

A greater sample size will provide a more accurate estimate of the vehicle's consumption tendencies. Knowing actual highway mileage would be good for calculating your fuel budget for a long trip, but for me, it would not provide much more than that.

Using this long term estimate, if you reset one of your trip counters on every visit to the fuel pump, you can accurately estimate how much fuel your car will require to fill up. This is useful if you need to prepay your fuel purchase without a credit card.

I always did this when I lived in Puerto Rico and never had to go back in for change (In Puerto Rico, many gas stations only accept cash, and in all, you must prepay for fuel):

If I know that over the long term, my vehicle averages 17.3mpg and my trip meter is reading 296 miles when I pull up to the pump, and I always fill the tank when I fuel up, I just do a quick calculation on my mobile phone's calculator to estimate how much fuel is missing from my tank:

296miles/17.3miles/gallons=17.19 gallons missing from my fuel tank.

You then multiply that result by the price of the fuel you are about to purchase to determine the price of the fuel you need to buy to fill up the tank again:

17.19gallons*$2.149/gallons=$36.94

Then I round down to the nearest dollar. Trust me, it sounds more complicated than it really is. It may only take 10 or 15 seconds to do.

Silly? Maybe... but it worked for me. I hated standing in line just to get my change back. Somehow, that line always seemed longer than the line to pay.
Modified by CaribMon71 at 10:11 AM 4/6/2009

[CaribMon71]

Another thing: I've always thought it would be interesting if car makers added an optional setting to our cruise control. One that would maintain RPMs (with only small +/- variances), rather than MPH. I think this would save even more fuel. This should be extremely easy to program into the current systems by merely toggling the Cruise On/Off switch. I could read something like Cruise MPH/RPM/Off.

I've had cars that drop a gear or two while climbing a grade on a freeway, just to maintain the set speed, while most other vehicles had slowed down due to the additional load on the engine. The result would be that I would end up dis-activating the cruise control to bring the RPMs back down again, even if it meant slowing down for a while.

Any opinions in this? Is it something that already exists?

[Bmore]

Yep, for me, long trip numbers are really just a part of the picture and not anywhere near the biggest part. It's nice to know that my car will get 24+ mpg on a long trip, because that's a money saver, but I take them super infrequently. Maybe a couple medium-sized trips a summer (200-400 miles) and something super long once every 5 yrs (if that). I really care about my overall mileage for the type of driving I do 98% of the time or for all my miles. I stink at math, so I've just been watching my computer indication of mpg. I've only had the car a short time, so I know this will change since it is an overall number, but right now it says 20.4. It's been hovering around 19 and 20. I spend time on the highway and off (live in a city but commute to work on a highway). I used to get 24 on average with my Saab 9-5 and 29-30 mpg on those 300 mileage longer trips.

[mkaresh]

TrueDelta conducts a real-world gas mileage survey that includes questions on driving style and driving conditions, so people can find the responses that fit the driving they do.

Results for the EX35 here:

Real-world Infiniti EX35 gas mileage

Join and post yours!

[specialist23]

sorry but i never understood the concept in that a greater/larger sample is better in determining real mpg. sure the more, the better in terms of trying to determine mpg, but that doesn't mean more miles in a sample. i would say a much better determining factor would be smaller samples, but more of them. perhaps 5, 50 mile samples. that way you get various driving times, samples, habbits, etc.

[mkaresh]

sorry but i never understood the concept in that a greater/larger sample is better in determining real mpg. sure the more, the better in terms of trying to determine mpg, but that doesn't mean more miles in a sample. i would say a much better determining factor would be smaller samples, but more of them. perhaps 5, 50 mile samples. that way you get various driving times, samples, habbits, etc.

The danger of relatively short runs is that discrepancies in how much the tank is filled have a larger impact. If you can somehow fill the tank to precisely the same extent each time, then your method would permit more data to be gathered.

[specialist23]

sure the weight of gas is going to make a difference, but i'm assuming it wouldn't make that much of a difference.

or better yet, just do more samples. 10, 50 mile samples then. either way, the longer a single sample is ran, the less precise it would be.

[mkaresh]

I don't think you're grasping my point.

The weight of the gas isn't the issue. The issue is that the amount the tank is filled is going to vary a bit from fill-up to fill-up. Might just differ by one or two tenths of a gallon. But over a short run this will have a much larger impact on the result than it would on a long run.

If you drive 50 miles, you'll be putting in about two gallons. If the fill deviates by two-tenths of a gallon, your result will be off by 10%. If you put in 15 gallons, the error will only be a bit over 1%.

[specialist23]

I don't think you're grasping my point.

The weight of the gas isn't the issue. The issue is that the amount the tank is filled is going to vary a bit from fill-up to fill-up. Might just differ by one or two tenths of a gallon. But over a short run this will have a much larger impact on the result than it would on a long run.

If you drive 50 miles, you'll be putting in about two gallons. If the fill deviates by two-tenths of a gallon, your result will be off by 10%. If you put in 15 gallons, the error will only be a bit over 1%.

that's why you go by the on board computer...

[mkaresh]

Not necessarily. I've often heard that trip computers can be a few MPG too high, that maybe they can't accurate measure fuel use around WOT. Might affect some more than others.

If the computer is accurate then, yet, it would be best for short distances.

[M45Caliber]

OK -- went and added up the miles and gallons in the little spiral notebook we keep in the door pocket to record all fuel purchases. Over the past 3,654 miles (just used the last 4 months of purchases) we used 173.2 gallons, for an average of just over 21 MPG. City and highway. that's BETTER than the EPA estimates so we're pleased. RWD not AWD and 15K on the odo now. a can of BG44K is run through the tank just before every oil change. We use only Chevron 92 octane.

[ayap888]

April 26, 2009 (New Update)

Just went from Orlando FL to North Carolina (638 mile trip) ... and I was able to do 24.6 MPG. I placed full tank when I left my vacation resort in Orlando. Then, 455 miles later, I reloaded to full tank with 18.5 gallons. So actual MPG was 24.6 MPG. Speed was 65 - 80 MPH ... and occasionally I went 90-100 MPH overtaking some annoying Florida drivers . Passenger was my wife and myself. And we had a good amount of luggage (had to lower the seats). Very pleased with the new mileage