bradykp

consumer reports had an article about different gas octanes. basically, it said something along the lines that you should use the octane that the car was designed to use. if that is 89, use 89, if it's 93, use 93. which makes absolute sense. with the ECUs in cars now, you can usually get away with using a lower octane (why you would want to, i don't know). but i believe if your car has a turbo, you should ALWAYS use the octane the manual recommends.

bradykp

my last tank of sunoco 93 averaged 25.1 mpg. i only have 2,000 miles on my car, so maybe this is why? i'm not sure. i've been trying to take it easy, and see what the best i can get out of it is.

dj Dozhe

with exception to all highway driving, the best avg mpg I've gotten is around 23. Though I attribute that to the fact that every time I'm heading into a turn there's this little voice in my head that goes "FASTER!". I am weak.

Found out last week that the back seats are quite slippery as I took a "spirited" turn and my back seat passenger slid all the way across the car. When she stopped sliding on the other side she was still sitting straight up, and then pleaded to drive my car.

TSX.Fury

That actually might be why. I didn't think it was true when I read other people say it but after I went past 10k miles my gas mileage def got better.

dj Dozhe

I'm only at 3500. Hopefully mine gets better.

bradykp

I've had 2 tanks that i averaged 23mpg, but that wwas with Hess gas, which i despise. Sunoco has given me the best so far, and i'm working on improving it. I saw no improvement on Sunoco 93 over Sunoco 91, but none of the NJ Sunoco's near me have 91.

dj Dozhe

From what I understand putting a grade of gasoline higher than than the suggest grade for an engine doesn't provide better results. If a car takes 89 putting 91 in won't help. I used to "treat" my old car to premium every once in awhile until I found that out.

bradykp

you are correct in your assessment. i do it only because Sunoco's near me do not have 91. i dunno why. they have 89, 93, and ultra 94. so if i want sunoco, i gotta go 93, which offers no imrpovement over 91.

alot of NJ gas stations don't have 91, i dunno why.

jlukja

bradykp

i certainly hope so. i bought this car so i can average close to 30, which being in nyc metro area would be quite an accomplishment. i'm semi environmentally conscious, but not to the hyrbrid level yet.

hmmmm...wonder if 2008 will add a hybrid model?

dj Dozhe

Not to take this in a completely different direction, but all the research I've seen on hybrids say you don't really make the money back for the extra cost of the hybrid on the gas you save. Not only that, but unless you change your driving habits the hybrid can't help you reach the level of environmental helper you're looking for.

As a note this is geared more towards the 200HP and up hybrids.

bradykp

I think this is 100% wrong. Depending on how much extra you pay for the hybrid (usually about $3,000 over the regularly priced car), you get a tax incentive for purchasing it, which is slowly decreasing over the next few years. on top of that you save gas.

Now, where you may not get the physical cost difference back, if you care about the environment, you're getting other "costs" back. You're personally contributing to the overall decrease of demand on energy, which on a largescale level would decrease energy prices overall. You're taking pollutants out of the air, which is another "cost" of running a vehicle, since you're helping to keep your local air clean.

there are costs that cannot be measured by dollars that you save, that most people won't quantify in this "research." While i understand people want to get their money back from a hybrid, that is not the sole purpose of the environmentally conscious people i know.

And, in the long haul of owning the car, especially if you do a lot of city driving, i think you can make back the cost of a hyrbid when including the tax deduction.

if you are talking about the course of 2-3 years, then no, you won't make it back.

the prices of hybrids will come down to the prices of other cars eventually as well.

I'm not only concerned with saving money on gas, i'm concerned with pollution as well.

dj Dozhe

All of my information was taken from Car and Driver from last year. I'll see if I can find the article. It was written to show that we need to continue looking for ways to improve our energy issues because the hybrid isn't a great solution, but it is one of the few solutions now.

bradykp

I believe you, because if you look at only reducing the amount of fuel consumption, a hybrid will not help most people, since the largest improvement is in city driving, and not highway, which offers almost no difference.

if you look at the new civic, it is fantastic, so the hybrid isn't much of an improvement.

but i don't think you can measure it in just the amount of fuel you consume, and you certainly can't in the short term. you have to look at at least 5 years of driving the car to even remotely recoup the real costs of the hybrid.

i think hybrids, as they come down in price, offer a step forward but not a solution.

bradykp

if you do find that article i'd love to read it though.

TSX.Fury

huh...? 3k? I don't even know if you could find one example that is within 3k let alone a majority.

Accord Sedan Starting $18,255
Accord Sedan Hybrid Starting $30,140

Ford Escape Starting $19,995
Ford Escape Hybrid Starting $27,515

Civic Sedan Starting $14,560
Civic Sedan Hybrid Starting $21,850

Lexus RX 330 Starting $37,065
Lexus RX Hybrid Starting $45,355

bradykp

the base hybrids are not equal in options to the base non-hybrids. at least not from what i've seen.

usually the hybrids have more options, and are comprable to the higher end non-hybrids. i'll look into it more later. but look at equally equipped vehicles. not just base vs base.

bradykp

Civic Sedan Hybrid....$21,850 (23,350 w. navi)
Comprably Equipped Civic Sedan....18,260 (the EX)

you can't compare it to the base, which excludes air conditioning, automatic, climate control, mp3 aux...etc etc etc

TSX.Fury

The point, however, would be that someone that wanted to get a hybrid instead of the gas powered model, could not afford it most of the time. If you only have a certain amount of money, and you arn't going to get those options anyway, you can't afford a hybrid.

I would agree with you if you could get the hybrid without those options but you can't. One of the reasons they only sell the hybrid with all those options is to offset the cost of the hybrid engine. They make so much on the options it helps them still make the car look ok to some people. If they were to sell hybrids without all those options they would only be able to sell them for a few thousand less, not the 10k that makes the price difference.

aascsm

AMEN!!!!

bradykp

well, it's still new. eventually, the hybrids will trickle down into more models, with less options, as the companies recoup some of their R&D costs. think of it like paying for Clariten (sp?) when it first came out, then paying for the generics that are pretty much the same after the patent expires. You can't fault companies for trying to cover their costs.

So hybrids aren't available in the lowest tier cars yet. Technology is hardly ever introduced at that level anyways. It comes from the top, and trickles down.

I think all things compared equally, the hybrids are still slightly too expensive, which is why i didn't buy one yet. But, the "savings" in my opinion cannot only be measured in dollar amounts saved on gas, as there are benefits that are not measurable by dollars that hybrids provide to people personally as well as to other people in your area. the intangibles that cannot be measured, but as more and more hybrids are sold, will have a big impact on the environment, the demand for gas, and overall health. all of these things are long term, but it's gotta start somewhere.

for example: what if every single NYC Taxi was a hybrid? That would have to have some sort of substantial impact on the demand for gas in the NYC metro area. Just a hunch, no factual data there, but just some food for thought!

LuvMyTSX

I agree for the most part, except that didn't they either reduce or get rid of the tax break? I know I remember it being discussed some time ago. So that will make a hybrid more expensive, at least right now, than a normal version of the car.

But I totally agree on lessening the impact on the environment and decreasing our dependancy for energy. We're going to run out of gas sometime, and we better have a new form of fuel when (not if) it happens!

bradykp

The tax incentive is gradually being reduced, until it is ultimately phased out completely. But there's a justification for that.

If the government subsidizes consumers with the tax incentive, the manufacturers would (in theory) just continue to keep the price higher. If the tax incentive is removed, the price of the hybrids should come down to the price consumers are willing to pay (since consumers figure in the tax incentive as money they will not be paying). how long this process takes depends on how well the demand holds when the tax break disappears.

I'm not worried about running out of gas, since it most likely won't happen in my lifetime, but if you care about the future at all, you should be worried about finding other energy sources and just being conscious of conserving energy in general. The point I'm making is that there are benefits that cannot be measured in dollars, that make the extra expense of a hybrid worth it to a lot of people. On top of that, the hybrids aren't as expensive as people think, when factoring in the current tax savings as well as the gas savings. It's just not enough yet to make up for the total cost. With gas prices as high as they are now though, America needs to wake up and realize SUVs and gas guzzlers need to go.

LuvMyTSX

I think they also either reduced the hybrid incentive or got rid of it altogether, so that will make it even harder to recoup the extra cost of a hybrid. Now that more and more people are buying hybrids, they don't have to have the incentive anymore. I know this was at least being discussed, but whether or not they've taken it away, I don't know.

TSX.Fury

100%

vidgamer

If everyone got fuel efficient cars, such as Honda/Acuras, we wouldn't be having this conversation. ;-)

I miscalculated, I got 26.9 MPG with this last tank! Hahah, that's a "bad" fillup. ;-) Gotta love it....

I don't deny that the hybrids are worth it if you want to help out the environment and/or reduce our dependence on oil, but I think it still is a bit more expensive (and thus not practical for most people). If you have the money, I think you should spend it on a hybrid if that's what you want to do. Go for it!

There was an article in Wired a couple of months back that discusses the price of oil and explains how the price of oil has to go up to make these alternative technologies worth the bother. As long as oil is cheaply pumped from the ground, we'll keep doing it, and when it gets harder, we'll do something else.

bradykp

i briefly saw that wired article. it makes good points. but the point is....even as people get irritated at high prices, americans brought it on themselves by not doing things to be efficient. SUVs, no car pooling, wasted trips, etc etc.

i agree, hybrids are slightly too expensive in my opinion, but right on the cusp of being worth it.