Horrible Gas Mileage

I somehow only get 13.5L/100 km highway on a 2012 Trail. Don't really understand how I'm getting nowhere near the 9.5l/100 they say on their site
 
Here is a picture of my truck. It was Demo 2011 TE modified. I bought it as is on the picture, I just modified the safari roof rack because it was too big.

Let me know what you think, I will post some pictures in the pictures thread also. I am just posting this here regarding the weak MPG it gets.

It had 2000km on it when I bought it. And one thing someone said they get 560km range on a full tank, I get 475 now. I used to get 530km range when I bought it so I don't know what went wrong. I bought it in June 2012.

I bought a new 2010 4Runner back in August 2010. For the first few tanks, the estimated range was about 620kms. It was not an exaggeration either because I kept track and I got very close to the mileage it predicted. After a few thousand KM's, it started dropping significantly. At 5000KMS I put GoodYear SA ties on it which seemed to drop the mileage from an average of 13.5l/100km to 14.5l/100km. When I traded it in (big mistake), it had 23,000kms on the odo.

I just bought a 2012 TE which had 10,000kms on the ODO (dealer demo). The range on a full tank was about 480KMS and the average was 14.7l/100km on the computer. The mileage on this one seems worse than my 2010 TE - and the tires are still stock! I'll check the tire pressure this weekend, maybe the air filter too. They said the oil had been changed, but I think I better check that too.

But to me it just seems that this truck sucks A LOT more fuel when it's not warm. Shorter trips are bad for the fuel economy in colder weather.


Rob
 
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Here is a picture of my truck. It was Demo 2011 TE modified. I bought it as is on the picture, I just modified the safari roof rack because it was too big.

Let me know what you think, I will post some pictures in the pictures thread also. I am just posting this here regarding the weak MPG it gets.

It had 2000km on it when I bought it. And one thing someone said they get 560km range on a full tank, I get 475 now. I used to get 530km range when I bought it so I don't know what went wrong. I bought it in June 2012.

Your truck looks nice : ) I'm not a expert by any means but in my understanding everything which increase vehicle weight and aerodynamic drag will result in bigger fuel consumption. It depends also on wind, gas quality and tires pressure.
 
Your truck looks nice : ) I'm not a expert by any means but in my understanding everything which increase vehicle weight and aerodynamic drag will result in bigger fuel consumption. It depends also on wind, gas quality and tires pressure.

Bigger tires. No computer reclibration. Going a little farther than computer thinks so your actual gas mileage is more than computer says. Don't have a calculator near me so can't say by how much but I think it's almost 5%.
 
Threads on the tires are bigger yes but they are the same as the stock if I am not mistaken. 265/70R17.

And for the computer calibration, does the Toyota dealer do this ? I know a little about cars but not how to calibrate a 2011 40k$ truck :)

But the 5% increase is about accurate on what I have been monitoring.

Like I said before I like my truck and I didn't buy it to save on gas, it's just that it bothers me a little with people doing 23mpg with the same truck.

I am only asking questions to see if I can improve the MPG or to see if there's a problem with the truck itself.

I thank you all for all the advices ( the 36psi ) (driving style) ( mods) and all that good stuff.
 
Mileage OK

I've got a little over 1200 miles on my 2013 SR5. I'm getting between 19.8 and 20.8 in mixed driving. I reset the economy after fillup. It seems to have gone down a little last month which could be caused by winter fuel.
 
i was very excited to get 20.5 MPG (per the computer) for 80 miles yesterday. that was going 75 on the highway for 90% of the drive.

coming home however, the overall mileage dropped to 19.4, I guess i was going into the wind, but i really didn;t notice anything.

oh well, one can only dream of 22mpg.
 
since middle of October I haven't had any trips, so my highway traffic was about 15% maybe. Fueled up yesterday, computer said that range dropped to 570 km (354 miles), and showed 12.8 l/100 km (18.4 mpg)average. I expect those numbers are going to become worse as temperature goes down and I don't plan any long trips unless X-Mas meaning that I'll get very little of highway driving. I'll reset fuel consumption counter and let you know stats for long trip if I won't forget.
 
I went to my parents house today with the kids to repair some things around their house.

It's about a 25 mile ride there, so on the way I reset the mileage and put it on cruise control at 62mph. I got 18.23mpg, I went and rented a trailer to load brick and and concrete around 800lbs and I got 17.55 for about a 5 mile drive to the city dump.

So basically mpg is fine, I past the 10k km's on it that's 6.5k miles I think.

My rig is lifted with big threads and roof rack and grill guard so I am happy now.
From what I read on the forums a lot of factors contribute to the mpg and I am satisfied with the truck now.

I will be going to Plattsburgh in 2 weeks with the family for some xmas shopping I will monitor the mpg again and get back to see if I can squeeze more mpg out of it.

Oh I forgot I cleaned my TRD air filter 2 weeks ago and put the tire psi to 36.

I also bought an air compressor with a tire repair kit, thinking about getting the 5th wheel (not a spare) from under the truck and see how it goes. Should I or big mistake ?

Please let me know.
 
I'm gonna assume you have L/100km and MPG backwards. :) Although 16.5 MPG is still really bad.

Although if those are combined with a lot of idling than perhaps it makes a bit more sense. I was thinking highway only.

No, I don't have it backwards. My completely stock TE is getting roughly 12mpg city driving - or worse. Today on the drive to work it actually went to 30L/100KM which is about 8mpg. I've checked the tire pressure and it's good. I have only 12,000kms on the truck. I know the cold weather has an impact, but this is ridiculous. It shouldn't be dropping the mileage this much... And no, I don't let it idle long periods of time either.

Rob
 
For those interested (and who have an iPhone), I downloaded a really good app for tracking gas mileage, consumption and cost. Visit Mileage Keeper - Homepage or go to the app store and download the app on your iPhone.

Very simple - all you do is enter the date, odometer, and amt. of fuel purchased (you can also enter cost if you like) and it keeps track of your mileage from your very first fillup (I had receipts from all my fillups - OCD you know). Also gives you a cumulative mpg to date and how much you've spent on fuel...very good app imo.
 
I'm at 1,5xx miles on my 2013 SR5 4x4 and I'm back and forth between 17.5-17.6 with 98% city. I haven't calculated by hand and I have never reset the MPG estimator. I'm hoping as I put on some more miles and eventually hit my first oil change it goes up a little.
 
I've tried out different driving styles doing only in-town driving with a full tank. If I drive average, which is subjective I know, I am sitting around 16mpg. On the same neighborhood, different day i filled up I tried to see how good I could get - 19.7mpg. It would be pretty easy to dip down into the 14-15mpg range just by varying driving style.

This is all from whatever the dash tells me, not calculating it myself. From what I've observed, driving style had a larger impact than I thought it would.
 
The mileage on my 4R TE is still quite bad and averaging 12mpg in the city or about 19.5L/100KM. I think the causes are as follows:

Slower city driving due to icy road conditions
Driving slower, below a shift point = higher rpm
Cold conditions causing the engine use more fuel to avoid being lean
Longer warmups, engine uses more fuel when it's not warmed up

But having this reduce fuel economy by about %40 still seems like too much. I don't see anyone else having numbers as bad as I am having.

Rob
 
My '13 SR5 4x4 w/Stock Tires and a good 300lbs of audio gear can range from 22MPG-16MPG (calculated at fill-up) depending solely on how much I have my foot in it (all highway / 110 miles a day, only 3-4 miles is off the highway).

I can cruise along at 65MPH with an "egg" under my foot and get 22MPG, or I can "dig in" and be aggressive and end up in the 16MPG range - choice is all mine...

RE: Rob_G - Have you tried "Sport Shift" mode to see if it might override some of your "held" gears at lower speeds?

:cool:
 
since middle of October I haven't had any trips, so my highway traffic was about 15% maybe. Fueled up yesterday, computer said that range dropped to 570 km (354 miles), and showed 12.8 l/100 km (18.4 mpg)average. I expect those numbers are going to become worse as temperature goes down and I don't plan any long trips unless X-Mas meaning that I'll get very little of highway driving. I'll reset fuel consumption counter and let you know stats for long trip if I won't forget.

So, for those who interested here's my humbers. Before we went to a trip computer showed 13.0 l/100 km and 552 km range. (18mpg, 342m)

I checked tires they all were 37.5 psi, loaded truck with all the gear, reset trip computer and off we went. Our destination was in about 900 km (560 miles). When we've arrived it showed 11.0 l/100km or 21.4 mpg. Range on the computer climbed to 604 km / 375 miles when I fuleled up last time. It was snowing most of the way, so my speed was on the slower side, 90 km/h (55 mph) was fast driving for the conditions. Of course I was avoiding any sharp moves, my acceleration and breaking were extremely smooth : ) About half of the time I had 4Hi on by the way.

On my way back weather cooperated - roads were dry and my speed was 120 -130 km/h (75-80 mph) most of the time. Fuel consumption climbed to 11.6 l/100 km (20.2 mpg) by the end of the trip. I consider numbers are not bad for winter gas, loaded truck and Duratracs C load at 37 psi.
 
I reset my mileage counter the other day and today it was reading 22.5L/100KM. That's 10.5MPG! WTF? It's -18c out (0.5 F) and at best the truck is run for 3 minutes before driving. I don't remember the numbers on my 2010 TE, but if it was ever as bad as this, I think I would have remembered. Tire pressure has been checked and is good. If I reset the counter when the truck is warmed up, I seem to get more reasonable numbers as long as I'm moving. But any idling (stop and go) and driving the truck when it's not absolutely %100 warmed up and it just absolutely sucks the gas. This can't be right. I'm even driving and trying to keep the eco light on.. I'm not heavy footed at all.

Well the truck goes in tomorrow for a bunch of stuff not working do a command start install. I'm going to add this to the list of my complaints. The truck is absolutely stock, there is no way it should be getting mileage that bad in city driving. I'm not getting even close to what you guys are getting.



Rob
 
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