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Sedans Chevrolet Cobalt Chevrolet Cobalt
2171 messages, Last post on Nov 23, 2009 at 6:04 PM
You are in the Chevrolet Cobalt Forum. Your Hosts are pat & karens
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Replying to: micweb (Oct 16, 2008 9:34 am) Thanks for the nice write-up. Some of the features you are enjoying on your 09 were present on the 08s, like mine. Mine came with XM radio (but not with OnStar), and my DIC control is on the steering wheel, not on the dash. I think you have an additional seven horsepower with your 2.2 L compared to my 08, which also has the 2.2 L. These little cars SCOOT, don't they? That's one of the main things I like about my Cobalt, i.e., despite its being a gas sipper, it still accelerates great. The light interior is going to be a problem, I do believe. EVERYTHING shows! I'm trying to be careful to avoid stains. I got a good coat of Turtle Wax on my Cobalt the other day. Man, it is sure easier to get the bugs and road tar off when I wash the car now. I can't believe I that I have been so careful about getting stains on the seats, that I have been hand washing the car practically every Saturday, and that I have even waxed the car. I bought this car strictly to have reliable transportation to work and back and to save money on gas. I wasn't going to be particular with it. I didn't plan on even keeping it clean. There was none of the usual "excitement" over buying a new car in this purchase, but the excitement has come from owning it. Tom |
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I was on my way home earlier today and passed a Corolla S. I don't think he wanted me to pass him, but I blew him off the road. I kicked 'er down, and before I knew it, I was going 95 MPH! That little Cobalt was still acclerating real well when I let off. I don't normally drive that way, but I was in a playful mood. Besides, I had to show that Corolla guy that he couldn't keep me from passing him. Tom
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Replying to: tsjay (Oct 24, 2008 7:22 pm) 
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Replying to: horsey55 (Oct 16, 2008 11:23 am) |
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I just refilled the Cobalt for the second time. DIC indicated 31.7 (reset on last refill) and my calculation indicates 31.1 mpg, which on the face of it is close but I don't have enough information to formulate a trend yet. Fill variations from gas station pump should make the DIC more accurate, but the DIC on my '06 read about 1 mpg consistently over my calculations. Anyway, I was about 1/3 of the way through an approximately 90 mile round trip when I had to refill, so I re-set the mpg and speed indicators after the refill to see what free-flowing freeway driving would show on the DIC, in comparison to the mileage I get from my commute, with is 70 miles round trip with a small amount of surface street when I leave, and moderate amounts on the other legs (freeway off to work, work to freeway on, freeway off to home). In this trial case, I had about 5 miles to my destination after leaving the freeway on somewhat congested suburban surface streets, and 5 miles of very free flowing main artery surface street back to a different freeway on ramp. So those surface street miles - more than my usual work commute - probably brought down the DIC mpg. What was my DIC mpg? A whopping 34 mpg. Subtracting my current apparent DIC error of .5 mpg, that gives me 33.5 mpg, or subtracting 1 mpg from my former car's error gives me 33 mpg - simply astonishing for an automatic, 2800 or so pound car. Apparently I have more "slow and go" and "stop and go" during my work commute; I also haven't learned how to time my "coast downs" to traffic and lights, the automatic holds it's speed more than the stick shifts I usually have, so I find myself having to break harder at the end. At one point I was on a 9 mile bridge going across water (hence very level) with no perceptible wind, going only 60 mph, and the instantaneous DIC option indicated 45 mpg (the instantaneous function is much better than on the '06, instead of measuring economy by a fraction of a second, which caused the indicator to jump around too much to be useful, it seems to have a longer duration, maybe a second or second and a half, which means I can readily see the effect of my foot, of ever so slight coasting and of almost invisible rises in the road). It would be interesting to see a club competition with one of these things driven at a constant 40-50 mph - probably quite phenomenal gas mileage. Of course, warming the car up and ANY amount of surface street REALLY hits the tank average mpg hard. My average speeds on the trip were generally around 60-70 mph and at the end of the 60 miles (the last 2/3 of my overall trip) the average speed on the DIC was 45 mph. I suspect interstate trips at 75-80 mpg would probably produce more on the order of 30-32 mpg, still excellent. I figured out why I like this 2.2 in the Cobalt over, say, the 2.2 in the old Malibu or the 2.4 in the new Malibu. You get TERRIFIC acceleration. I remember from my test drives of the old Malibu that acceleration was more than adequate, but as the poster a couple of posts up notes, even with an automatic Cobalts can be darn quick. By the way, for those of you who want to experiment, reset both the mpg and average speed indicators on your DIC when you refill. You will probably note a very strong correlation between average speed and average mpg. The higher your average speed, the more you have been freeway cruising, and average mpg rises with it. If you have an average speed of 25 mph, you are probably driving a lot more city miles than you realize, or have been sitting in traffic or letting the motor run while waiting to pick someone up. |
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I posted this on the "Cobalt Real World MPG" discussion. It goes along with what you were saying in your post. Speed really does kill gas mileage. I took a 265 mile (each way) trip yesterday and checked gas mileage. The pump failed to shut off automatically when I filled up on the other end of the trip, and a good amount of gas overflowed before I could get back over to the nozzle and shut it off. I was on the other side of the car getting ready to clean the windshield when I heard the splashing noise. The last time I made the same trip, I averaged 33.7 MPG. I did a little experiment as I drove across I 64 in southern Illinois between the Wabash River and Mt. Vernon. I reset the average MPG on the DIC and drove a steady 70 MPG for 15 miles, and the MPG reading was 32.7 at the end of those miles. I reset it again and drove a steady 60 MPH for about ten miles (had to stop at a rest area) and got 37.5 for an average MPG for those miles. Tom Can you BELIEVE the acceleration of these Cobalts? For cars that get such great MPG, the acceleration is fantastic. Tom |
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It's the first time I drive with winter tires in 33 yrs of driving. Last night the car in front of me made a sudden stop, when I applied the brake at my surprise I slid and almost rear-ended the car in front of me. On another occasion, I was turning after making a "dead stop" and when I starting to turn, my wheels spun making a "screeching" sound (first time I make my tires spin, I was surprised again. Is it normal for a winter tire to do so on dry pavement? or my "new" tires are no good?
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Replying to: grosloup (Nov 04, 2008 10:36 am)
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Replying to: tcalof (Nov 04, 2008 5:22 pm) Thanks to you I had a good night sleep knowing that it's totally normal. |
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Please read, and then post comments, on the Edmunds article here: http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/Drives/FullTests/articleId=134506 I don't know what it would take to make them happy - maybe a $35,000 Prius instead of a $15k (after rebates) Cobalt XFE? Hopefully the current economic situation will remind people that thrift is a virtue, not a punishment, just like the trend in some forums is to discuss, and hence value, careful driving for MPG. |
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