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Automotive News & Views Are gas prices fueling your pain? 
10042 messages, Last post on Jul 12, 2008 at 3:07 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: andre1969 (Apr 12, 2008 7:36 am) My last trip to the ski hill this season was yesterday. I drove up 35 times, and it's 50 miles round trip. My Subie gets about 22 mpg overall. So...1750 miles, ~80 gallons used, call it $3 a gallon for the last 3 months - that's $240 in gas for snowboarding this season. Or about $7 a trip. For perspective, a day ticket is $46. But a season pass only costs $199. Last year the Subie used 308 gallons or ~$926 in gas. So far this year I've burned 107 gallons of gas in the Subaru or $323. I don't want to update those numbers with the actual cost of gas - using $3 a gallon is bad enough. 
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Replying to: andre1969 (Apr 12, 2008 7:36 am) But as I was driving home from dropping him off, I started thinking: it's about 150 miles round trip, so at the price I am paying now, even in my car, the favor cost me about $15! We don't think about that kind of stuff usually, or at least I don't, because it's not money coming out of our wallet at the moment we are doing it. But the thinking of five years ago, that driving is a cheap activity that is automatic rather than one that requires weighing need against cost, needs to go out the window because trips lke this cost real money now. Not that $15 is some killer cost that is going to throw my whole budget off, but just a few trips like this one would add up to 25-50% of my car payment!
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Replying to: nippononly (Apr 12, 2008 11:35 am) I think at one point, I actually got the Intrepid down to about 5 cents per mile, when I took it on a trip back in the early '00's. I guess those days are gone forever!
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Replying to: andre1969 (Apr 12, 2008 1:49 pm) The Echo does a lot better (46+ on highway trips), which is why I usually take that car for the longer trips when I'm not carrying a bunch of stuff or extra people.
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Replying to: nippononly (Apr 12, 2008 9:08 pm)
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Replying to: gagrice (Apr 13, 2008 6:31 am) According to the EPA figures, there's actually not much difference. A 2000 Echo, for instance, is rated at 34/41 with the stick shift, while a 2007 Yaris stick is 34/40. Using the newer, lower numbers, that drops a bit to 29/36 with the Yaris, 29/37 with the Echo. It's also been mentioned that with the Echo and Yaris, it's not hard to beat the EPA figures. And any leadfoot could still probably beat the new downrated numbers.
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Replying to: andre1969 (Apr 13, 2008 7:17 am) But even in the Echo, I am up to almost 9 cents/mile just for the gas alone. That seems pretty high whan you consider that three years ago at this time, it ran about half that. That was a few months before Katrina, when gas prices jumped way up, never to subside again here in California. It's funny, looking back, that we took such affront at the $3 gas prices back then. They look pretty good today as I pay $4/gallon, and I imagine we will look back in 2010 and long for the good ol' days of $4 gas....
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Replying to: nippononly (Apr 13, 2008 10:01 am)  about 47-48 mpg. The cost per mile using VA gas which is E10 is about $3.15-$3.20 ( $.9.50 ) or about 6.55 cents/mi. Using NC gas which has no ethanol in it I get 49-50 mpg thus use about 2.9 gal but at a price of $3.25 / gal. That's still $9.50 or about 6.55 cents/mi. The Lord Giveth and the Lord Taketh Away...or less piously 'You can pay me now or you can pay me later.'
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I've averaged around 16 MPG for the 145K miles that I've driven my car since I got it in 2003. I still have the window sticker, and it was rated (2003 rating) at 15 City, 23 Highway. I've seen huge swings - my typical city commute can drop a tank to 12MPG, at an average speed of 17-20 MPH. If I take the machine out on the open road, I've gone a couple hundred miles at 2500 RPM in 6th gear, and averaged 26-29 MPG. This feels like the "sweet spot" for this engine... I know that if I run the thing flat out - above 3000 RPM in 5th, let's say, it will suck fuel at a rate of about 14-15 MPG. Ironically, when I look at the economy conundrum, I wonder about where my gains would be - as much as I love the open road, if I were to try to roll along at 1500/2000 RPM in 6th to save some fuel, I'm not sure of how beneficial - I don't spend as much time as I would like on highways, and the city economy isn't gonna change much, no matter what. I have definitely eliminated idling time when waiting though. |
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