Anyone See CBS last nite - fuel differences in SUV & Prius?

[leftyladyfrommo]

It was amazing. They have three vehicles going from the South to the North along the East Coast. They had gone about 650 miles and the cost for the SUX - it was an Exporer or an expedition - was over $1200. The Prius was at about $69.

I guess I had no idea of what the real figures were. So now I should probably go buy a Prius. Except I can't afford one.

I'm afraid I am just stuck with going fewer miles. That is the only way I can really conserve at this point.

[still_one]

1. you can buy the base Prius for about 22000 dollars

There is a 3000 dollar tax credit this year on the prius, civic, and insight. Others have a lower tax credit based on their mpg

Eventually prices will come down as more competition comes into the market

If you buy a non-hybrid civic or other similar type car you would get about 30 some miles per gallon. The Prius without trying will get you about 45 miles per gallon. So there are conventional cars which will still get you more than 30 mpg, and at a much cheaper price

[immoderate]

5. Isn't there still a tax break for large SUVs?

I think it's because they are considered commercial vehicles. I also think that the tax breaks for hybrids are limited. I hope someone has more updated figures if I'm wrong.

--IMM

[Billy Ruffian]

10. only if you're self-employed n/t

[Lochloosa]

11. Yep...and it must weigh over 6000lbs to qualify.

Amazingly the Hummer weighs 7800 lbs.
The H2 is 6200 lbs.
The H3 is a light weight and does not qualify at 5800 lbs.

The business can right off up to 100,000 bucks. Nice huh....

On Edit: After a little research the law was changed. To qualify for the 100K it has to weigh 14,000 lbs.

You only get a 25K write off on something over 6000 lbs.

[SacredCow]

7. I have an '06 Saturn Ion...

I track my mileage religiously, and get anywhere from 29 to 31 MPG out of each tank (Mix of city and interstate driving). Unfortunately, I rack up a lot of miles and am seriously considering getting an inexpensive motorcycle to take to work as much as possible.

[Jayhawk Lib]

8. Eventually prices will come down as more competition comes into the market

Are you saying the manufacturers of the hybrids are gouging us? Doesn't that offend you?

[LostinVA]

18. I get 50-55 mpg with my VW Golf TDI

However, you can get a base Prius for about 4k more. That 4k was just a bit too much for me.

And -- biodiesel is now cheaper than dino diesel!

[bullwinkle428]

31. Beat me to the punch! I was going to post that if they did the test

doing essentially all highway miles, the TDI engine would actually outperform any hybrid on the market, except for perhaps the Honda Insight, which is barely a car at all (not bashing Hondas - I own one, and have driven them almost exclusively for nearly 20 years). Unfortunately new Golf TDIs are about as rare as hen's teeth these days. The only widely available VW TDI right now is the Jetta, with a base price around $22K. They'll only be available through the end of the 2006 model year, and won't be offered for 2007, due to the changing regulations on diesel engines. The forecast is they'll be back for 2008, along with some offerings by other manufacturers (Daimler-Chrysler most likely).

[Clark2008]

21. That's awful! That much?

Damn - I am not going to pay over $18,000 for a car (actually, not even that - I'll buy a bit used).

So basically, to save gas, we have to be wealthy enough to afford at $22,000 to $30,000 car that looks like a small bubble?

I'm sorry - I'll wait until they come out with some sportier looking hybrids and keep my unfortunate gas guzzling sports car. (Note, that last part was a joke. My Mustang gets 25 mph in the city and is big enough to handle driving around all the truckers I have to drive around in my city - the small size of the Prius scares me in that aspect, given where I live. I admit that I haven't really noticed the high prices of gasoline because my car as always gotten good mileage - I keep the tires properly aired and the oil changed).

[Kolesar]

2. $2.00 per mile for the S-U-X?

Sounds high. I think my car is 10 or 15 cents/mile, IIRC

[fmlymninral]

3. sounds high

sounds high   SUV would have used 400 gallons of gas or less
than 2 MPG and  prius would get 28MPG

[newyawker99]

33. Hi fmlymninral!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[boise1]

4. If I recall, it was over $200, not $1200.. n/t

[helderheid]

9. I thought it was $190+ - regardless it was amazing the difference. edit to

add video:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/04/tech/main1584978.shtml

Click on "Eye on the road day 3"

[leftyladyfrommo]

24. Sorry - you have to be right. It still is a huge difference - just

not huge.

[napi21]

6. Something is wrong with the cost of the SUV traveling 650 miles.

I admit they're gas hogs, but for it to cost $1,200 it would mean it only got 2.2 MPG!

I have a Mercury Marquis, and it gets 22 MPG in the city driving. I realize that's not GREAT, but it's paid for, it's a 1999 and only has 45,000 miles on it, and I just don't have the $$ to buy something else. The car's value to ME is MUCH higher than I could ever sell it for.

[Billy Ruffian]

15. You can drive many, many miles for the cost of replacement

Also, there is the overall impact of building the new car that you'd be driving. Let someone else, that needs a new vehicle, get a new, more efficient vehicle. Do what you can to maximize your fuel efficiency, and drive that Marquis until it breaks.

A car that size would be a great car pool vehicle ;-)

[MazeRat7]

12. Did they mention the difference in towing capacity between the two ?

Just curious. I would be really impressed to see a Prius move a travel trailer or boat 650 miles.
Seems like a flawed comparison since the point of large vehicles is generally not fuel efficiency.

If they really wanted to be dramatic they should have compared the fuel efficiency of a hummer to a moped....

MZr7

[theDash]

14. I'd also be impressed ...

... to see a Prius haul a trailer. But I would like to point out, that for every 100 SUV's/Large Trucks I see driving around, maybe one is pulling some kind of trailer or boat. Here in the South, and probably elsewhere, a big vehicle is a status symbol. It's the modern day version of being able to light cigarettes with dollar bills - it's saying, hey look at me, I have money to burn ...

[uncle ray]

16. most of the big SUVs don't even have the towing capacitiy

of a similar sized pickup.

[LostinVA]

19. You beat me to it -- I see pickups pulling boats and trailers

Sometimes even cars... but very, very rarely an SUV. In my area, they are usually driven by people who have no idea what a bass boat is...

[napi21]

20. You may not see it being done but that doesn't mean they can't!

My son's wife insisted she had to have an Expedition! My son finally gave in because he needed a vehicle that would pull their camper, and the SUV fit the bill a bit better than a truck since they had two kids and a dog that went camping all the time too.

I never let my DIL forget that I believed most people buy those monsters as a status symbol, and I still believe that, but they are in fact built on a truck chassie.

[LostinVA]

26. I'm not saying they can't, just that I never see it around here!

[WoodrowFan]

23. hell, I can tow with my old Saturn wagon

I have a class 1 hitch on my Saturn wagon. I use it a couple times a year. It'll haul 2,000 lbs (including the trailer weight, usually 800 lbs give or take)

You don't need an SUV to tow light loads. The funny thing was when I had my hitch put on my car in Manassas it was surrounded in the lot by all these HUGE long bed pickups and monster SUVs. You could have fit my car in the bed of some of those monsters...

[LostinVA]

25. We used to pull a decent-sized boat with my Dad's square-back VW

in the 70's... just a wagon, really.

[Billy Ruffian]

13. Numbers don't pass the reasonableness test

650 miles. To make things easy, put the fuel at $3.00/gallon.

Put the Exwhatever at 10 mpg (I think the real highway MPG on both the Expedition and Excursion is better than that, but let's be pessimistic)

650 miles/10 mpg = 65 gallons of fuel. 65 * 3 = $195

Put the Prius at 55 mpg (its real life highway MPG works out to be about 45 mpg, but lets give an advantage to the small car).

650 miles/55 mpg = 11.8 gallons. Cost = $35.40

While the efficiency of the small car is clearly better, the $1200/$69 ratio is off by an order of magnitude.

You don't need a Prius. Just get a small efficient car. If you can get new, there are a lot of choices: Toyota Yaris or Corolla. Honda Civic or Fit. Nissan Versa.

Also, if you keep your car, there are lot of things to help. You're already driving less, and that's a big help.

Make sure your tires are properly inflated. I usually run about 3 psi (cold) over the manufacturers recommendation. Get yourself a good tire gauge, and don't depend upon the gauge attached to the air hose at the gas station.

Make sure you change your oil regularly. A 5000 mile oil change interval is fine.
Consider switching to synthetic oil (some people feel that they get better fuel economy with synthetic, but proof of that is probably outside the capability of the consumer).

Make sure your air filter is clean. If it's dirty, you're choking your engine, and burning extra fuel.

Accelerate smoothly and moderately.

Anticipate traffic ahead of you so that you can maintain a steady speed.

The magic number I've heard is 3%. If the US was able to reduce its consumption 3%, the price would plummet. Doing what I've outlined will probably save you, as an individual, 3%. If everyone did this ...

[lectrobyte]

17. Numbers are way off. As someone who's getting ready to drive 600 miles in

a Prius (one way), that's roughly 12 gallons of gas, or $36. If I took an SUV that got 10 miles to the gallon, that would be 60 gallons, or $180. It's not too hard to figure out fuel costs. Take the number of miles driven, divide by MPG, then multiply by $3 or however high gas is by the time you read this.

I get in the low 50's commuting, and around 48 on a long trip. In theory, that should be 61 city, 51 highway, but I don't have that much stop and go, and I like to go fast when I can. It's pricey for a small car, I agree, but then I started out looking at Jettas and Volvo S40's, so it's not that far out of line.

[zbdent]

22. Here's what would be a really interesting comparison

get the Prius up against an American-made "hybrid" vehicle . . . since the only hybrid vehicles American manufacturers seem to want to produce are SUVs, it would make a really interesting comparison to show the real difference between the gas mileages. Of course, the Prius would likely have to stop more times and wait for the other "hybrid" to fuel up . . .

[woo me with science]

27. Make sure you do a lot of highway driving.

There is a study just out showing that the Prius is much worse than a Honda Civic or Accord when used for city driving. The savings come when you are on the highway a lot.

[NickB79]

29. Link?

The regenerative braking and running on the batteries at low speeds should make the Prius better than all other cars for city driving, not worse.

[woo me with science]

32. You're right. I got it backwards.

I accidentally wrote that it's good for highway driving and bad in town, but I misremembered--the opposite is true. It's still information worth knowing for people who use the highway a lot. The data I guess came from Automobile Magazine, so you could maybe find more complete information there. Here's an excerpt from the article, though, which is pretty interesting.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/3811297.html


"The car that started the hybrid craze, the Toyota Prius, is lauded for squeezing 40 or more miles out of a gallon of gas, and it really can. But only when it's being driven around town, where its electric motor does its best and most active work. On a cross-country excursion in a Prius, the staff of Automobile Magazine discovered, mileage plummeted on the Interstate. In fact, the car's computer, which controls the engine and the motor, allowing them to run together or separately, was programmed to direct the Prius to spend most of its highway time running on gasoline because at higher speeds the batteries quickly get exhausted. Indeed, the gasoline engine worked so hard that we calculated we might have used less fuel on our journey if we had been driving Toyota's conventionally powered, similarly sized Corolla -- which costs thousands less. For the owner who does the majority of her driving on the highway, the Prius' potential for fuel economy will never be realized and its price premium never recovered.

"For years, most of the world's big carmakers have shied away from building hybrids because while technologically intriguing, they are also an inelegant engineering solution -- the use of two energy sources assures extra weight, extra complexity and extra expense (as much as $6,000 more per car.) The hybrid car's electric battery packs rob space from passengers and cargo, and although they can be recycled, not every owner can be counted on to do the right thing at the end of their vehicle's service life. And an unrecycled hybrid battery pack, which weighs more than 100 pounds, poses a major environmental hazard.

"So the ideal hybrid car is one that is used in town and carefully disposed of at the end of its days. Hybrid taxis and buses make enormous sense. But the market knows no such distinctions. People think they want hybrids and they'll buy them, even if a conventional car would make more sense for their pocketbook and for the environment. The danger is that automakers will co-opt the hybrids' green mantle and, with the help of a government looking to bail out its troubled friends in Detroit, misguidedly encourage the sale of hybrids without reference to their actual effect on oil consumption."

[lutefisk]

28. Almost all new SUVs are get low to mid-20s mpg on highway

At least according to Consumer Reports- the only controlled and unbiased real-world mpg testing results widely available in this country. Sure, low to mid 20s isn't as good as the upper 20 to low 30 mpg range that many cars achieve on the highway, but it's much better than the numbers being thrown around- 10mpg on the highway?

For example, the CR test of the big Cadillac SRX SUV, complete with 320hp V8 and weighing 4700 lbs, measured 24mpg on the highway (11mpg in city only driving). In fact, many new SUVs are in line with minivans, and some cars, for mpg. Of course the compact SUVs like the Honda CRV are as fuel efficient as many small cars.

Just trying to correct the idea that SUVs get 10mpg on the highway. If you can find a reason to attack me for pointing this out, go for it. :spank:

[Beaverhausen]

30. Did they mention the difference in the emissions?

There are environmental issues here as well. Hybrids have very low emissions.