Previous owner poor MPG

[brages]

The last two cars I've bought are hybrids. In both cases, they keep a pretty good history on the MPG for the trip odometer. On both my Prius and Accord Hybrid, the previous owners seem to have been getting in the 30s for mpg.

On the Prius, I'm assuming the owner short tripped a lot and that kept the mileage low. He was not driving a lot of miles per year. We've been getting around 45 mpg, a bit less in the winter but still over 40 for every tank that I can remember. Pretty typical mileage, about average for Fuelly.

On the Accord, the previous owner racked up a TON of miles, 100k per year. "Trip B" shows an average of 32-something mpg over the last 70,000 miles. I'm not sure how that's possible unless he was either driving way over the speed limit or sitting in the car idling for hours at a time. I think he said he was using the car to drive all over the state for his job working for some kind of food distributor, making serious $$$ from the mileage reimbursement. Maybe he's a bootlegger, lol. I believe I'll be able to hit 40-mpg per tankful in this car when the weather warms up based on what I see on warm vs. cold days.

 

[Opelman]

Heck, I routinely get 5-7 mpg better than my wife.

 

[RhondaHonda]

They were probably both track cars, Ubers, rentals, or fleet cars that just ran all day.

 

[KrisZ]

One probably sat a lot idling, like maybe dropping off and picking up kids from school. The other probably did a lot of highway at 75-80mph, which will severely drop the MPG on most hybrids.

 

[himemsys]

Heck, I routinely get 5-7 mpg better than my wife.

Our 2018 CRV is my wife's ride. When she's driving in town, she has a hard time getting over 20MPG. I drive around town and I can get close to 30MPG. On the highway, we both get 30-34MPG. She's just a bit more aggressive with acceleration, which can make a big difference at low speeds.

 

[fdcg27]

As you wrote in a previous post, these cars hate the cold. I just notched a 40 mpg tank since it has been cold here. I began using the car in Oct 2018, so you can imagine how disappointed I was until the coming of spring when I saw my first 50 mpg tank.
In warmer weather, the car will do better.
If you can restrain yourself on the interstate and set the cruise in the young seventies, the car should do 47-48 mpg at warmer ambient temperatures.
In local driving, it isn't hard to exceed 50 mpg, if you drive gently.
That has been my experience with my Gen 10 HAH over 117K miles.

 

[Hall]

On the Accord, the previous owner racked up a TON of miles, 100k per year. "Trip B" shows an average of 32-something mpg over the last 70,000 miles. I'm not sure how that's possible unless he was either driving way over the speed limit or sitting in the car idling for hours at a time.

By my quick math, that's a little over 400 miles a day. Not sure what someone working for a food distributor would be doing driving that much though, unless they were actually making deliveries, which seem unlikely with an Accord. They aren't going to accumulate miles by sitting idling though, plus, that will kill your MPG. 32 mpg (overall, granted, it has to be 90+ % highway) isn't terrible for an Accord.

 

[brages]

You know, I'm kind of fuzzy with the numbers. I remember when we were signing the title that I thought he had done 100,000 in a year, but... it probably was a bit less than that.

Likewise, I'm not certain about what his job was, thought it was some kind of sales position related to a food distributor.

 

[Marcozi]

100k miles a year!!!! Yikes!

 

[PF52]

The last two cars I've bought are hybrids. In both cases, they keep a pretty good history on the MPG for the trip odometer. On both my Prius and Accord Hybrid, the previous owners seem to have been getting in the 30s for mpg.

On the Accord, the previous owner racked up a TON of miles, 100k per year. "Trip B" shows an average of 32-something mpg over the last 70,000 miles.

Be wary of those numbers, unless you know how often (or if) they reset themselves. Hondas reset the MPG when you reset the oil-life monitor, at least some Hondas do. On some cars, like my Cobalt, the displayed MPG is only based on the past few hundreds or thousands of miles. I could set out on a 200-mile road trip and by the time I got there, the displayed MPG could have gone up by 3 or 4 or 5 MPG.

 

[zzyzzx]

They were probably driven like they were stolen.

 

[brages]

I just ran across this photo from the ad for the car. It has a couple of odd things:

1. The battery shows fully charged. I don't know that I've ever seen my battery fully charged in the time I've owned the car.

2. It looks like it's showing 40.5 mpg over the last 2537.6 miles on Trip B. But - I reset Trip B not long after getting the car. And I can see the history for Trip B on the dash - 37 mpg overall since I reset it (5000 miles) and 32 mpg over the previous 70,000 mile interval. So I don't see how the seller got it to show 2537.6 on Trip B.

So it makes it look like something got faked for this display -- but I'm not sure how or why. I stumped. It seems like a lot of work for a very subtle deception.

 

[StarCaller]

View attachment 270212

I just ran across this photo from the ad for the car. It has a couple of odd things:

1. The battery shows fully charged. I don't know that I've ever seen my battery fully charged in the time I've owned the car.

2. It looks like it's showing 40.5 mpg over the last 2537.6 miles on Trip B. But - I reset Trip B not long after getting the car. And I can see the history for Trip B on the dash - 37 mpg overall since I reset it (5000 miles) and 32 mpg over the previous 70,000 mile interval. So I don't see how the seller got it to show 2537.6 on Trip B.

So it makes it look like something got faked for this display -- but I'm not sure how or why. I stumped. It seems like a lot of work for a very subtle deception.

Different car?

 

[brages]

Here are my trip A and B and dash pics today:

 

[fdcg27]

I typically see a fully charged battery pack on arriving home since the last half mile or so is downhill and run in regen.
Based upon my experience with my 2018 after 120K of daily use the fuel consumption you're seeing seems really poor.
Even driving like you stole it you should see low forties consistently which should improve as the weather warms.
I've seen 50 mpg+ for the last two tanks, about 1150 miles total.
Trip B, reset when I changed the oil in November shows 44.8 mpg after about 6800 miles.

 

[brages]

Average on fuelly is 41.6, which is just about what I've gotten over the last 1500 miles (actual mpg seems to run 1.2-1.5 mpg higher than the display). I got a bunch of mid 30s tanks in the winter.

https://www.fuelly.com/car/honda/ac...ased on data from 75,0.15 MPG margin of error.