All,

There has been lots of discussion on gas mileage for the RDX which seems to reflect how one drives the vehicle (frequency of engaging the turbo). As a result I have seen postings which range from 12 mpg to 25+ mpg. Gas mileage is important to me since I commute 100 miles a day, mostly highway and back roads. I drive very conservatively; within the speed limit (most of the time). I am not a jack rabbit start or stop kind of person either, slow starts and stops. I know, why am I considering this vehicle if I am not going to drive it like a sports car but I have other reasons, size, looks, feasibility, etc., all important features for me. So back to my question, if there is anyone in this forum who has similar driving habits as I please let me know what your gas mileage has been.

 

I find driving this car somewhat hard renders a bit better gas milage then driving it softly like you will. I tried, tested and true.

Either way I always tend to average between 15-16l/100km in 80% city driving and 20% highway.

This is about 15.6 MPG I beleive.

 

i am currently managing 18.x mpg under conservative driving in the city. On the highway, I do about 80mph average, but I dont downshift to speed up. There were spurts of 22 mpg, but that's a bit hard to maintain.

Under spirited riving, I manage about 15-16 mpg, but this is obvious.

Talking about spirited driving, in the past 3 years, my civic with a b16 motor was averaging 20 MPG; yes, 20 MPG, under spirited driving. During a recent trip to RENO, I wanted to see what I could achieve while driving without agression, expecially on the highway. I managed to pull 30 MPG!!! The civic is the daily driver, so I cant really complain about the RDX.

Ease off the the pedal on the rdx, and you will achieve decent gas mileage.

 

On my drives to my summer house, (1.5 hrs on the highway) i was getting around 21. Im basically a city driver, on a conservative week ill make around 15.5/16, having fun around 14.5-15. The difference between driving this truck conservatively around the city and having fun is so minimal to make any kind of gain in mpg, so i just basically love tossing it around.

 

Yeah, if I flog my GTI VR6 the average drops to 19 mpg, but it will do 32 mpg highway. High rpm means more cylinders firing per mile; cut your acceleration from 6000 to 3000 rpm and you should theoretically use half the fuel.

There is also the theory that rapid acceleration gets the car to its most efficient cruising profile faster than slow acceleration, thus saving fuel, but I have never been able to make it work.

That's the secret. My wife drives the RDX daily with occasional boost employment, and I drive it mostly boosted on weekends. Trip B (reset at oil chg, aprox 5500 miles) shows 20.5 mpg.

The only true measure of fuel economy is fixed speed, level highway cruise. The RDX gets 27 mpg @ 65 mph.

 

I drive 60 miles round trip for work. 3 miles of that is getting to and from the freeway. I avg. 19 to 23 during the work week. When I am off I do some fun driving that brings about 14.5 to 16 mpg. On trips to Houston I avg. 23 to 25 on a 200 mile round trip if I keep it below 65. If you stay around 55 you will see a BIG increase in mpg.

 

Wind resistance and low gear operations are what will eat up mileage. OP should get about 20-22 mpg on average. What would help is when people post their average mpg, also post the average mph. That sould give the clearest picture. 45-50 will get the best mileage. Withe each 5mpg increase, wind resistance goes up up exponentially. A dramatic real world example of wind resistance and mpg was on myth busters tv show where they documented the effects of drafting a semi at different distances. pretty cool stuff.

 

About 2 decades back during a gas price-hike crisis, BMW conducted testing on getting the best mileage from their cars. I recall reading an article about it in Car & Driver. The bottom line was that as gasoline engines are most efficient in an unthrottled state, using about 2/3 throttle to get to cruising speed produced the best real-world results. Of course, many things have changed since then, not the least of which are drive-by-wire and sophisticated fuel management systems, but I believe some basic mechanical physics remain the same.

With overall driving condtions I've encountered and my basic driving style (enjoyment of gratifying thrust combined with velocity and smooth transitions), no commuter traffic driving, I've averaged 20.5 for the 4000 miles on the clock.

 

...also, so far I've avg'd. 19.3 over 7500+/- miles (not looking at computer in car) for all the driving I've done.