Hey guys, I've been viewing the forums for a while now, but I've just decided to make an account. So a small introduction, im 17, and I just got my first car. A 04 TL. I love it everything but the gas has been killing me. I know its supposed to suck up a lot of gas, but im getting less than 300km per tank. I got my oils changed aswell as the air filters. I do tend to have somewhat of a lead foot, but I still dont think i should be getting less than 300km per tank.

I got 244km on my last full tank ... btw im in Canada, so yeah its snowy and i let my car heat up for 5ish minutes before taking it out. Is this normal? Any suggestions?

 

Welcome and congratulations on your first car. Stop and go city driving uses more gas. Cold weather, snow, and a lead foot uses more gas. Highway driving at a steady speed gets the best mileage. Short trips are also big gas burners. Hope this info helps.

 

Telling us you only get 300 km per tank or 244 km per tank doesn't really tell us anything. You need to tell us how many MPG's (or km per liter in your case) you're getting. Aside from the gas needle not being the best way to measure fuel efficiency, you also don't state at what point you refill the tank.

And to add to what MR1 stated, winter blend gas will also kill your MPG. What's the tire pressure at? Colder temps can affect the tire pressure too. What percentage of city vs highway driving do you do? Combine these things with you warming up the car for 5 minutes (consider an engine block heater), bad road conditions, your lead foot (racing from stop light to stop light?), etc... and you have a receipe for low fuel efficiency.

Read this: http://www.metrompg.com/posts/winter-mpg.htm

 

The trip computer is telling me im getting around 19-21L/100km... And i just filled up today when my gas light was on and the trip comptuer says 301km until im out of gas again.... :|

Do you think there could be any mechanical issues, or is this all normal for winter mileage?

 

Check you tire pressure. Check your engine air filter. Check/replace your transmission fluid. Is it possible you are using a low grade gasoline that is causing knock/ping and a retarded timing (I don't know if the TL does this like the RL)?

 

19-21 liters for every 100 km is like 11.2 - 12.38 MPG. That's not so great.

The TL is rated at 18 MPG city, 26 highway, and 21 combined. If you're driving mostly city, then 12 MPG wouldn't be uncommon in the winter with winter fuel, if you have a lead foot, and are letting the car idle/warm up for 5 minutes every day.

Please answer these questions:

• What's the tire pressure at?
• Are you running snow tires? If yes, what size are they? (snow tires can sometimes reduce fuel efficiency due to rolling resistance of aggressive tread)
• If you're not running snow tires, what tires/wheels are you running? (i.e. stock or aftermarket... and if aftermarket what size and weight?)
• What percentage of city vs highway driving do you do and what's the traffic condition typically like for you? (e.g. Is it bumper to bumper stop and go traffic? Is it clear and flowing at posted speed limit or better? Is it a little of both?)
• In the city, are there a lot of stop signs or traffic lights that you're running into?
• Your lead foot... does that mean you like to mash on the gas pedal when at a stop?
• How fast do you drive in the city and on the highway?
• How many passengers do you typically carry with you?
• How long are your typical driving trips?

As for mechanical issues, maybe your spark plugs are old and worn and need replacing. You may also want to see if the PCV valve is dirty/clogged or not. Try cleaning the throttle body and IACV. Check to see if the brakes are dragging or not. Dump a bottle of Chevron Techron fuel system cleaning in your tank at next fuel up. How many miles on the car?

So many possibilities....

 

What the hell is a km?

 

Alrightt,
-Tire pressure is at 32.
- Im using stock tires
- I rarely drive on the highway. Id say 90/10 and no the city driving isnt bumper to bumper, its clear and flowing, and im usually driving around 80km an hour so 50-55mph.
- And only 2-3 stop signs before i get onto the main roads, but im usually doing 25mph places with stop signs.
- I only mash the pedal when there are no cars ahead of, and ive been doing it less recently.
- I usually carry 2 Passengers with me
- Usually 5-10minutes max.

Ive been debating between weather or not i should get my spark plugs and my needles checked.

 

Oh, and yeah i already got my transmission and engine oil changed, aswell as my engine air filters. I pump 91Octane.

 

Release the emergency brake.

 

Welcome! I'm going to move this to the TL forum so you can connect iwth other Acura TL owners and get more specific info for your car.


Also, do not warm up your car for 5 minutes. Wastes gas and does nothing. All you need is a good 30 seconds (maybe a minute if it is absurdly cold) to get the oil flowing... then just drive at low RPMs until the temp gauge shows the car is warmed up.

 

A kinky midget

 

Your trip computer also tells you what your average km/hr speed is that you drive, that is the best indicator of your type of city/highway driving.
19-21L/100km is crappy though.

 

I agree, I only idle for about a minute before I drive off. I know it doesn't get as cold here on average but even when cold I do the same. I also never turn the heater on until water temp raises to normal driving temp.

 

, but even a minute is overkill. The most potential for damage is done on a cold crank. If your oil isn't flowing then, you have more to worry about than driving out of the driveway.

Silly kids and their old school parents. I bet he changes the oil every 3k too.

 

300km/tank is a joke, something is not right there. I drove my TL hard, and in temperatures that can reach -40c it didn't use more than 450-500/tank.

I also let my car idle for a few min, sometimes 5-8 min before I drive. Mind you I don't sit there, I start it from my office so I don't' have to sit in -30 weather and freeze my ass off. Also helps the snow melt of the windows so cleaning is quicker

 

Yeah man something sounds wrong here! Perhaps OP needs to clarify what he means by "somewhat of a lead foot". Fast acceleration obliterates efficiency, and when coupled with 90/10 city/hwy, your fuel economy is going to be just awful. Then again, maybe there is actually something wrong.

OP, you should drive your next tank like an old grandpa (slow acceleration, steady cruising, never mashing the gas pedal, etc) and see how this changes things. This will tell us if it's your driving habits, or if there really is something wrong.

 

I also get 250-300 km per tank. I live in Canada and I definitely have a lead foot and never drive on the highway. Always stopping at stop signs and traffic lights

 

Im in Vancouver and am in the same boat as you. Guess the TL doesnt like canadian gas?

Avg around 280 kms before fillup 48L.

18L/100km
19KM/h AVG speed.

 

Montrealer here.. i get around 150-175 kms on half a tank of 91 octane (Petro Canada) which after doing the math, is similar to what you're getting on a full tank. I do have a lead foot as well and do 80% city and 20% highway. I have a Base 08 TL 5AT with 43k on the odometer. 5AT TL's definitely have worse fuel economy than the 6MT TL's. OP didn't mention if he's 6MTor 5AT though. I get worse fuel economy on my TL than than the 5th gen 4AT maxima that it replaced..

Maybe it's a Canadian thing lol.

 

OP, what's the mileage on your car? Maybe you're a little behind on other maintenance?

 

Son of a bitch. Does anyone ever bother to search anymore? We have one of these every day now. I'll say it for literally the 50th time. Mpg is directly related to average mph. I get 13-15mpg on average which is completely normal because my average mph is only 13mph.

Transmission fluid does not affect mpg except in extreme cold and even then it's practically immeasurable.

A dirty air filter has zero effect on mpg. These cars are not carbureted.

 

You can't make a blanket statement like that. We have a positive displacement oil pump. Pressure is near instant. Flow (volume) is the same cold or hot hence the higher oil pressure when cold. Cold lubrication is not a problem. Areas that are not pressure lubed such as the cam lobes sit in a pool of oil so lube is still instant. The crank floats in its bearings. Pressure is not required for a journal bearing to work, just rotation. In other words the residual oil left in the bearings float the crank the second it rotates during that split second before fresh oil arrives on a cold start.


About warning it up for a minute. It can be beneficial. Piston to cylinder clearance changes more from cold to hot than any other clearance. Unless you're able to drive it very easy during warmup, getting a little heat in the pistons is always a good idea.

The 3k oil change went away due to fuel injection and better oils. Run the car in extreme cold for short trips and 3k is still reasonable. I've had the MID show it's time for a change after 3,500 miles for my 1.5 mile trip to work. I had already changed the oil because a year came up first but it was interesting how early it will allow a change under those conditions.

 

Umm the car has 181km soo just a bit under 115k miles.

 

As a Canadian TL owner there are two things that I noticed in this thread and I have to point out.
1. Winter blends. Find a gas station near you where premium gas has a maximum of 0% ethanol. They are harder and harder to find since Petro Canada and Husky have up to 10%, but for example Shell has 0% in their premium. Your fuel economy (and engine?) will thank you.
2. With a lead foot and 90% city driving I am able to get 13L/100km in winter driving. I'm not saying that's good, I'm just saying that with spirited driving and the right fuel you can get good economy as long as you're 'smart' about it. As mentioned don't floor it if you know that the next set of lights is always red, let off the gas when you see the light in front of you is red (coasting to a stop is much much more efficient than being on the gas up to the second you slam the brakes).

So yes, drive as a grandpa for a while to make sure it's not the car (don't forget to reset the MID). If/when you find out it's not the car then you need to work on your lead foot, to make it a 'smart' lead foot

 

quit letting the car warm up for 5 minutes. start it, wait less than a min and drive off or let it run while you clear off snow and ice. Excessive idling K I L L S gas milage...expecially when the car is COLD (Open loop). the fuel mixture will not lean out until the car gets up to operating temp (closed loop).

 

02 sensors do get lazy over time.

just sayin'

 

Hmmmm alright, ill check my 02 sensors. Would the check engine light be on if the 02 sensors needed replacing though?

 

If they're really bad, yeah, the CEL should come on for O2s. You can't really practically 'check' them. People just blame O2's for anything to do with poor fuel economy. It won't hurt to just throw new ones at it, it might help. They're not what most people consider cheap, or even that easy to change.

Honestly, your numbers sound fairly reasonable. Cold weather and everything that goes along with it can absolutely trash fuel economy. This is your first car, so you probably never paid much attention to winter fuel economy before. Winter usually means a cold engine, excessive idling, lower tire pressures, snow on the roads leading to increased rolling resistance, lower speed traffic, often even more stops due to lower traction and increased caution, increased electrical load, heater cranked further reducing efficiency, winter blend fuel.... If it gets well below freezing where you live, and you have snow on the roads daily, it can be a HUGE factor.

Most of these factors are compounded in wintertime with short drives. On a short drive, I see about twice the fuel consumption in winter as summer. It can get worse than this too. On a really bad day, I can get single digit MPGs, whereas I get mid 30's in summer over the tank. Thats >3x worse. The car is the same.

 

not until they are really degraded.

get yourself a scanner that can read real-time data and connect it to the car and watch below video for some details

 

So true. I think you were the one that inspired me to get a block heater. I can't wait to try it out in a warm climate because my drive to work is 1.3 miles and 1.7 miles home. I truly think it's going to help considerably even on those 80F mornings since the trips are so short. I just have to come up with a plan to reduce as many variables as possible to be as accurate as possible. Got to do my timing belt that I bought 20k miles ago that's 20k overdue first though.

 

I recently got another car, and figured I would be able to get away without a block heater. Well, I made it two months and realized I want a block heater. It's great.

Outdoors, as long as it's not extremely windy, it makes a difference. In a garage, or with no wind, it gets the car right on the cold line when you crank it. For me, on a cold day, it's the difference between ~2 minutes for the thermostat to open, and ~10. Faster warmups makes for a more comfortable drive, less wear on most everything, better fuel economy, even a quieter car since its not idling super high. It's not very expensive, not very hard to install, and not very hard to use. It even saves most everybody money on fuel. I'm not sure why almost nobody uses them unless it's 40 below zero.

The 400W factory block heater is a bit low power for the J. It really could use ~600W to get the warmup times down. 400W on a D works great.

 

Sounds like you and all the suggestions you have done "should" help you KPG. I do know my 07 Type-S is a gas HOG. Around town driving like a grandma I get about 15mpg which I think is about 6.6 kilometers per liter.

60 miles is 100km = 1.66 km is 1 mile.
1 gallon = 3.8 liters
15mpg x 1.66 = 24.9
24.9 div by 3.8 = 6.6 kpl

I think your getting great kpl

 

I'm getting 14L/100km driving like a grandma with the occasional lead foot (90% city, 10% Highway) using Petro Canada 91. My average speed is around 27km/h.

 

Really! Wow, I average 26 with combined city/highway (normal commute) and can average 31 on road trips, even with four people, trunk full of luggage and cruise locked on 80mph. I don't complain about mpg at all and I guess I shouldn't.

What type of fuel are you using, if not using 91 or better it will hurt mileage and your type of driving is already going to place you in the lower mpg range.

What do you mean by "needles"?


Ethanol does lower the mpg so higher ethanol values will lower it yet even more. Just one of the many bad things of ethanol...

 

OP: if you want a quick partial answer to your question, pick a gas station near a freeway on a non-snowy/traffic day, fill-up, drive on the freeway and track how many KMs your drive for 1-2 hours, then refill using the same pump. Divide the KMs by the amount of gas. On the freeway, hopefully you're above 10 KM/liter (23 MPG), otherwise you may have an issue.

Which block heater do you use - the pad (that lives under oil pan?), or the plug that is installed into the coolant? I'm new to this, but live in Colorado and have been thinking about this for a month or two (since 10-straight days of single-digit high temps). Thanks!

 

I looked into the various options, and the only one that appears to have negligible chance of increasing issues down the road, while being reliable, is the OEM freeze plug heater. I believe most any Honda/Acura block heater will 'work' in any car, so long as it's not from the 80's or something. The one I got for the TL I think is designed for a Fit, and I have one in a Civic thats made for a 2nd gen TL. I had another random one in an Accord too. They are all the same heater element, that threads into the block coolant drain. The difference is the cord length, amount of zip ties, and instructions. I think they are something like $70-80 new from the dealer, you might be able to find a new one for sale on eBay. You can get aftermarket brands that thread in too, lots of them appear to be unreliable.

It takes ~10 minutes to install on the TL if you can get the drain plug off easy enough. I can probably do in in 2-3 minutes now. I never drained the coolant. Take the plug out, screw the heater in really fast, top off the overflow tank. I rounded off the drain bolt in the Accord, but I got a bolt extraction kit and worked wonderfully. Theres enough room to get easy enough access to it on the J's. They bury the thing on D series.

400W does the trick if you have a few hours. If the car sits overnight and you know when you're leaving in the morning, it's simple to set up a cheap timer into an extension cord and never worry about it. If you're looking to preheat an engine outdoors in 10 minutes, you can get 1500W+ recirculating heaters with pumps that will do the trick. I'd imagine a 3kW unit would heat a block up to near operating temp in 15 minutes. Those units are expensive, fairly large, add a point of failure that generally results in a coolant leak, can overheat an engine if the temp switch fails, are physically large, and generally difficult to install. If you're looking for a little assistance on a cold day, just get the factory Honda/Acura heater.

I personally like the WeMo timer, since I can turn it on/off remotely, from my phone. It works well, and gets the time over the internet so presumably you don't need to fuss with having a power outage screw up your timer. I've had it for a year or so and never think about it anymore.

 

I don't know how 11mpg is even possible. A year ago, I had my battery replaced and ECU reset. I was mashing the gas pedal off of every other light and stop sign and just down right flooring it on the highway. The worst readout I got was 13mpg, and that's driving like an idiot on a 3.5L. My average during normal/somewhat spirited driving is about 20-21mpg. I do 40% city/60% highway.

 

It's easy to understand how someone could get 11mpg. The reasons were posted by Zomgvtec. Plus mpg follows average mph. If you do pure city driving and your average mph is in the low teens you will get bad mph. Mine typically stays around 13-14mpg with a 13mph average. You can't say some %highway and some %city. That's a guess and it does not tell us what your average speed is. For me with the incredibly bad and probably purposely badly timed red lights I average only 13mph. I've seen others who average 40mph city. That's the difference in 13 mpg and 27mpg.

You can floor it at 70mph and still get 13mpg. Floor it at 13mph and you're around 2-4mpg. If you floor it 70-90mph and let off and coast back down to 70mph, the injectors are shut off until you hit the throttle again so you're using no fuel and when you return to the throttle to maintain speed you're getting at least 28mpg vs zero sitting at a light. With very low speed city driving there not a whole lot of opportunity for decel fuel cut.

 

My tank average is generally substantially higher than most people claim is possible, and I can get single digit MPG's no problem in really cold weather on a short drive. If that is just how you use the car, you're going to average that over the tank.

Anything below ~5 MPG I would think is unrealistic, but possible. 7-8 MPG is just what you're going to get on something like a 3 mile drive in 0ºF weather. The numbers just go down from there if you idle the car 15 minutes before you leave, that's 15 minutes of 0 MPG and surprisingly high GPH with a cold engine. I hope most people can recognize the reason for poor fuel economy in that case.

This is not new stuff, or specific to Honda/Acura. The Prius has a thermos that holds warm coolant to help keep the engine warm for a day or two. That's one of the few vehicles that will provide fairly consistent fuel economy.