Gosh...I forgot to follow up on this. Overall, it showed 21.7mpg. Not great, not terrible. I verified this number at the gas pump.
Started out early in the morning with 78% charge on the battery. It had 17% battery when I picked it up at the airport. The charging cord was hiding in the spare tire well, and had never been used prior to me. I picked up that additional 70% of charge in around 8 hours or so, using a 110 volt outlet.
One thing that tripped me up, was that I raised the hood (to check the oil and washer fluid) while it was plugged in/charging, and it stopped charging. After opening and closing the hood several times, and plugging and and unplugging the charger... it wouldn't resume charging until I uplugged it, started the gas engine, shut it off, and then plugged it back in again. Maybe there's something else that I'm missing here... but that made it take a charge again and that's all I cared about.
I left it in Hybrid mode to see how far I could get until it got down to 50%, then I put it in e-save mode, to save as much of that 50% as possible for later in the day. I made it across 65 miles of 85% interstate, 10% two lane, and 5% urban before switching over to 'e-save' mode at 50%. At this point, the gas gauge showed that I'd used around a gallon of gas. I determined this because the 'miles to empty' calculation for the gasoline had gone down by 20 miles.
I saved the rest of the 50% to use on the return trip home. However, it ended up being more like 40% because it kept putting itself back into Hybrid mode after it had been shut off... and I didn't catch it right away. Everytime the engine is shut off, it automatically resets to Hybrid mode when re-started. I'm not surprised that it does this by default, but not a fan of it, and maybe it can be changed to default to something else in the settings somehow. The Hybrid/Electric/e-save switch is in a horrible spot on the dash, completely obstructed by the steering wheel. It isn't obvious as to which mode it is in, unless you look.
When passing on two-lane roads or on the interstate, this thing was a rocket. It goes from 60 to 100 in about 4 seconds. This powertrain could easily run at 90 miles an hour, all day long (but I'm not sure how well it would do when the battery is at 0%, and it is solely reliant on the 2.0 turbo). It was silky smooth when at speed and out on the open road. I constantly had to whoa it down from 80+ on two lane rural highways. There was little perception at all as to how fast I was really going.
It was nice and quiet on the inside, but there were times when under demand that the 2.0 engine would get thrashy and noisy. The steering sometimes had an annoying tendency to gently wander to the left and right, but I suspect that it might have been tracking in and out of slight depressions in the asphalt pavement, pounded in by semi trucks. I've felt the same sensation on roads that are so rutted by semis, that you can see the water standing in the ruts and no where else, after a light rainfall.
There was so much light coming through the dual panel sunroof (above both front and back seats) that it washed out the navigation screen. Maybe there was a way to make it brighter, but I never found it. Plus it doesn't help that the nav panel is angled upwards towards the sunroof.
The ambient wrap around soft mood lighting in the cabin, that lit up after dark was a nice touch as well.
All of the typical nanny functions were there and available, including lane keep/lane departure and whatnot.
The Google navigation and the Alpine stereo system were top notch. I felt that the seats were too hard, and simply weren't as comfortable as they could have been. It seems to me that sometimes, the leather is just stretched way too tightly, and it makes hard seats even harder. I do love the shape and comfort of the cloth seats in the 2019+ Ram 1500 trucks though.
When I got home, it still had 8% on the battery, so I ran it back out to the airport in electric mode. It played what I could call "new age" (relaxion/meditation/yoga) music ever so softly through the stereo, I assume to cover up some of the noise/whine of the electric drivetrain. But driving it in electric mode gave me the full appreiciation of how much it contributes to the gasoline drivetrain. And it burned through all 8% in less than two miles.
Unfortunately, there was no window sticker to be found, and I really wanted to find one. It had Missouri plates and was registered to EAM Holdings (aka Enterprise) out of St. Louis.
Yep, I'd drive one as a rental again... gladly. To own one at around $65,000... no thanks.
Having Breakfast at the Triple XXX Family Restaurant/Drive-In in scenic downtown West Lafayette, IN.
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