Like I said before, mpg doesn't really mean much to me... although I know 17mpg and below is NOT good.. and that is where the majority of votes are going so far on the US poll.. :(
What about you guys?

Oh and you might want to post if it's 6spd or auto.. although I suspect most are 6spd. Two votes for 15L so far..

Still breaking in, still driving like an 80 year old nun, (well, maybe a nun who likes hear the tires 'chirp'!), trying to keep under 3750 revs to keep the secondary ports shut.

Seems to empty the tank pretty quick, 360/370 kilo's per fill....
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doc

edit- 6MT GT with the 220hp motor........

Originally posted by Doctorr
6MT GT with the 220hp motor........

:D

I've filled 3 times - got between 13 and 15 l/100 km. Ask me again in 2 weeks, after I get back from our 6000 km road trip to California for the Monterey Historics at Laguna Seca!! Woohooooo! :cool:

Regards,
Gordon

15L 6-spd


I was told to open the secondary ports every once in a while.

This is done because it will not have much power straight out of the box. It will also overheat if you do not break it in correctly. If done correctly it will extend the life of your engine. The secret is to let it burn a little rich. Overheating will eventually ruin your engine

Mazda Mechanics told me to gradually bring the car up to speed, not to stay at a constant Rpm, and to push the gas every once in a while to break in the engine properly.

They told me that if you break in the car slow ..... it's gonna be slow.

I wonder if the supposed "incorrect fuel maps" have anything to do with this dissappointing ( a little ) fuel economy..? or do you guys consider this normal for a rotary engine while it's still breaking in? Do you think the fuel economy will improve or worsen once you can actually take the engine to redline? How many litres does the tank hold?

The hp thing is becoming less of an issue for me but the fuel economy is flying to the top of my "issues" chart with a bullet. Transport Canada figures show 12.8L/100km for city and 9.2L/100km for highway. This I found very acceptable, it is a sports car after all... but 15L/100km:confused: Aye Carramba!! My friends will be able to chant "Chug-a-lug...chug-a-lug...chug-a-lug" when I'm visiting the gas pump. It's as bad as an SUV. I mean, for such a small engine (1.3L) it drinks like a V8:eek:

edit: BTW the tank is 60L.

When I was breaking my Teg, The fuel efficiency increased by about 1L/100km after 2 months but then I started to drive above the 4k RPM. I average about 10L/100km city and 8L/100km driving to TO (doing avg 130/hr). If I can resist the urge of breaking 110/hr it drops to 6.5L/100km:cool: but I usually last only a 40km before I'm back to crusing at 120-130.

I got about 13.6 L/100 km on the one tank I checked. It was still during the break in, so I kept it under 5000 rpm. And most country driving with a bit of highway and town driving mixed in.

Oh, and its a GT wtih a 6 MT.

I voted for 15L/100km even though I have yet to fill up.

Basically when I hit 100Km on my trip meter it was down 1/4 tank which is 15L!

EEEK! I'm with mac, if it's only 220hp whatever it's DAMN fast still, but the problem is on my calculations it is going to cost me $10 a day to drive to work and it's only 10Km each way!


You can actually watch the fuel guage drop as you drive even if you drive like an 80 yr old nun.

On the "break in". The manual states to drive the car using the entire range of RPMs. It says to not rev about 7000 for extended periods of time, but it does not say anything about NOT to do it.

Although I am being carefull I hit 7500 RPM once. There is also recommended shift points in the manual.

I believe to get good mileage, you really have to drive like a nun. It seems the recommended shift points are basically 2500 rpm. Takes a bit getting use to because my previous car (tiburon) wouldn't even begin moving until 4k.

Everyone in Ottawa drives fast though, taking off from a light shifting at the recommended points leaves you in their dust.

Wing,

Not sure how you arrived at $10 a day in gas. If you get 15l/100km then 20 Kms driven daily would consume 3 litres a day. Luckily we don't live in Eurpoe where 3 liters might actually be close to $10, but here even at a high $.80 a liter you're looking at well under $3 a day...

Sharky doing that calculation yes, but today it took like 12liters to get 20km? Unless the gas guage is wanky.

I'll wait till my next tank. I'm doing a 300Km trip this weekend, all highway in 6th gear. Hopefully that will make it MUCH better.

Yeah, I don't think you can accurately estimate mileage based on the guage alone. You'll need to bring her to empty from full and see how many clicks you've travelled for the amount of gas bought.

Have fun on your weekend road tour!

On my first 2 fills, I averaged 15.5L/100km (mostly city, shifting between 5 and 7k).

I'm just back from a trip (450km, 22C, humid, light wind). Only highway, cruise control set at 119km/h, 6th speed. I got 10.6L/100km.

I sure hope those numbers will get lower has the engine breaks more and more. So far I have 1100km on my car...:

Originally posted by Sharky
Yeah, I don't think you can accurately estimate mileage based on the guage alone. You'll need to bring her to empty from full and see how many clicks you've travelled for the amount of gas bought.


...actually, the best method is to fill your tank right to the top (pretty easy to see when gas is spilling out of it :p but obviously you don't have to go quite that high), and record your km's from there. then at your next fill up, see how much you have to put back in to get to full. you'll then have pretty darned accurate volume and very accurate distance numberes. because the volume number is so small, accuracy here is really where it counts, as error has a bigger effect on the ratio.

Originally posted by Wing
Sharky doing that calculation yes, but today it took like 12liters to get 20km? Unless the gas guage is wanky.

I'll wait till my next tank. I'm doing a 300Km trip this weekend, all highway in 6th gear. Hopefully that will make it MUCH better.

Wing, fill it up, reset the tripmeter and do your estimation with that method.

Cuz You CANNOT be doing 60 L/100km !!!!

Originally posted by Smoker
Cuz You CANNOT be doing 60 L/100km !!!!

...unless you sprung a leak ;)

I'm getting about 14.1L/100km. But now I just drive the way it's meant to be driven........HARD!!!!!!!!! :D

Ok I filled her up!

276Km = 36 Liters

That's 13L / 100km

Mostly city. That's basically doubly my tiburon which was 7L/100Km

Hopefully now that I've gotten use to the car I have learned to shift more efficiently.

Cost me $27 to fill it up though, STICKER SHOCK! It wasn't even down to the last 1/4 use to fill the tib for $22 from bone dry and make it 600 Km!

It should get better. I'll change my vote to 13 now, and I'll see what it does on the road trip on pure highway, with a little city.

Another fill up. 41.2 L for 302.4 km.
Still getting 13.6 L/100 km.

Just filled up mine. the light was on and the gauge very low. Put in 50 L and was at 420 Kms. a tab under 12 l per 100km. Went to Ottawa wednesday, highway, 119KPH as well and i had 10.5 Lper 100Km on that trip.

Now one question here: Anyone filled up when it was very empty yet? the yellow light was on and i managed only 50 l in... does that mean there were 10 l available?

Yeah highway isn't too bad, I went to Cornwall and back from Ottawa today, about 150K each way, less than 1/4 tank for each way. It will be hard to guage my highway usage on this fill up as I drove around in the city 65Km took almost a 1/4 tank then highway was A LOT less.

How much to go from Ottawa - Montreal and back? I will be doing this in a few weeks.

It's about 210 kms one way so figure 450 kms round trip. you'll do it on one tank if you fill it up before leaving and cruise at 119 !

How do you like your car so far?

Awesome on the highway, you can cruise so quietly!

I cruise at 115Km/h So I should get more mileage :)

i bet you get 10 l per 100 K at the speed, keep us posted.

Yes, it seems the tank low level light comes on at the 50L mark, leaving you with ten available.

However - it is probably not a good idea to go much lower, fill it up at the light - modern in-tank fuel pumps will suck it down to '0', but they may be damaged doing it.
They use the last bit of fuel as a coolant and a 'heat sink', they are designed to run submerged and their life may be shortened by running un-cooled, and will definately be shorter if you actually empty the tank to the point where they run dry....
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doc

I figure around 40kms when the light goes on will take me to the 55 L mark, plenty to keep everything in order i guess.

Ok just filled up again!

Damn I wish the cost of gas would go down. It's not the consumption so much as the price of premium that is kiling me!

$40 for 49.78 liters! Total distance travelled 472Km.

So about 10.6L/100Km

That's not too bad, it wouldn't be so bad if it was regular, but even regular is way over 70 cents a liter these days! I paid 80.4 cents!

This was about 300Km highway and about 170Km city.

That's pretty good mileage Wing.

It would be pretty cool if everyone continue to post their L/100km on here to see if the mileage gets better as the cars gets a few more km's on them.

Also, once the numbers seems to become pretty stable, it would be interesting to see if different grades of fuel would affect the mileage of these babies.

I remember reading on one of the GTA Car forum, people did a long term test and came to a conclusion that by putting in Premium Fuel, they gets better mileage with that cars. So it would interesting to see if this holds true for our RX-8 as well.

I think that would be a great idea. But it would be important to also state the source of fuel ie Shell, Sunoco, PC etc. That way we could see if there is a difference between the brands.

I could host an on-line database for people to input their data (threads make it a little difficult to extract the data). Guys, let me know if this is of any interest.

I only fill at Esso....points for the Touchless wash baby!

The one at Brant/Lakeshore has a wicked touchless washer...no tracks to scratch the rims or anything...just drive in, spray down, air blowers dry you down...and you're done.

More to the topic's point...I'm getting crap fuel economy thus far. This tank I'm now at 1/2 full, and I've only gone 130kms.

Hope that improves...but I'm relatively used to getting poor gas mileage with sports cars.

Esso Supreme in Ontario is actually very clean sulpur wise compared to their regular and mid grade. With my current car I get an extra 50-100km per tank using Esso92 over the other big companies, Sunoco, PC, Shell.

10.6L per 100km! That's great! How heavy on the throttle/rpms were you?

Hi Quick_Lude,

Pretty heavy...I drive with a bit of a lead foot, and don't believe in smelling the roses on the way to cruising speeds. Plus, I friggin love the sound of the engine as it rips up to 7-8K.

Those kms were mostly city driving.

If you're an Esso fan too, do you have your Speed Pass young man?

http://www.speedpass.ca/Canada-English/Products/Speedpass/im_Speedpass_550x104.jpg

Best thing since sliced bread :)

I finally remembered to get an application.. Not a huge fan of their regular and mid grade fuels, they have a lot of sulphur. For some reason the Supreme is low on sulphur though. Well, according to this data from 2002:
http://www.ene.gov.on.ca/envision/air/sig/2002.htm

Five points:

1/ Just filled up after lots of mostly highway 'k's, and got 23.3 imp mpg, 12.2L/100. Not TOO bad......

2/ If you really think that one companies gas will get you 100 kms more on a tank, you are truly deluded.....

3/ Did you know that you can read the trip meter & odometer without the ignition on? Faint, but the numbers are there.....

4/ If you look at the government's,
Sulphur Tests (http://www.ene.gov.on.ca/envision/air/sig/2002.htm) , and you live west of Ontario, you will be pleased to know that all Shell stations are supplied from their new state of the art synthetic crude 'Scotford' refinery, some of the lowest sulphur gas in the world.....

5/ Sulphur is only a concern in regards to SO2 emissions, acid rain etc., and has no bearing on fuel consumption at all at the ppm levels we are talking about....
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doc

I was fairly light on the throttle, I think I hit it hard a couple of times, but that's about it.

Basically shifting every time at 3k

I have a speedpass, it's nice but ummm Esso is ALWAYS more expensive here. Today for example, regular is 75.9 but everywhere else it is 71.4!

I can't believe these prices! Just a few weeks ago regular was 63 cents! GRRRR just when I get a new car the prices SHOOT up!

Oh and touchless washes are so great, apparently the chemicals they use can harm your paint! :eek:

I do not buy the 10.6 L/100km.

I had the (nearly) ideal condition for monitoring fuel consumption with 100% highway driving and good control over amount of fuel burned (went full tank to full tank). I burned 160L of 91 octane fuel (what's that, slightly more than 3 tanks?) exclusively on the highway for 11.85 L/100km (19.96 mpg).

This was the first run in my car (picked up the vehicle 1350km from home) so I was not hard on it at all (as per break-in specs). I would expect the mileage to improve as car breaks in and once we get past the early fuel map in the computer.

But who really cares anyway? I've stopped monitoring fuel efficiency. After all, who's got time to watch the odo when I'm busy staring at the tach???

Barry

Buy it or not, that's what I got 472Km on 49.76 liters of fuel. I filled up at the same station, heck even the same pump. When the pump clicked I filled it for 2 more cents. First time I filled it, it stopped at $26.98 so I filled to $27, the second time it stopped at $39.98 and I topped it to $40.

Ok that's actually 10.5L/100Km!

My driving was 65Km in the city, then I drove to Cornwall about 140Km from my home, then I drove to crysler, than back to cornwall, then back to my home in ottawa, then I drove to sears, then home depot then I went to work, then home and filled up.

It was mostly highway like I said, I'm hoping the car get better mileage as it breaks in. It does seem like that.

As today I drove 50Km and the needle only moved down 1 line from full!

Originally posted by Doctorr
2/ If you really think that one companies gas will get you 100 kms more on a tank, you are truly deluded.....
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doc
I have an anal habit of resetting my trip odometer 99% of the time after I fill up to the top and monitoring my fuel consumption. I've been doing this pretty much since I got my current car in spring of 2000. I said 50-100km but it's more like 50km. So with Esso92 last week I traveled 595km and put in 54L of gas. If I was using ANY other of the big four, I would have put in about 60L. Well actually I'd be out of gas but that's a different story. So yes maybe 100km was overly optimistic but the 50km is TRUE, as much as it doesn't make any sense. :confused: Many other members from our Toronto Prelude club have noticed the exact same thing, a slight improvement in fuel economy from Esso Supreme.
I know it's not because of the sulphur levels, I threw that in as an interesting tidbit since for the longest time Imperial oil had the worst reputation for dirty gas, and still does when it comes to the regular/mid grad fuels if that chart is correct.

Just filled up after i tried to be gentle on the gaz for a full tank. I did mostly highways at 115 or so and was shifting at 4k max the rest of the time. I put in 50.9 L for 440 kms. It 's 11.57 l per 100k.

I don't think i will get more than 11l per 100k ever but i can live with that.

Originally posted by mac
I think that would be a great idea. But it would be important to also state the source of fuel ie Shell, Sunoco, PC etc. That way we could see if there is a difference between the brands.

I could host an on-line database for people to input their data (threads make it a little difficult to extract the data). Guys, let me know if this is of any interest.

That's a great Idea Mac, Anyone here interested at inputing their Fuel Data into an Online Database ?

I could input but not sure if it's much help, I always try to fill up on thursday at 3 cents off at Ultramar. :)

Just went 378 kms, filled 51.4 lires. (the light was on)
That's 13.6L per 100 km.

I have been driving mostly aroud town, and lots of rips up to or near the red line.

I agree with Deep Blue, fabulous sound at high rpms.

Originally posted by Wing
I have a speedpass, it's nice but ummm Esso is ALWAYS more expensive here. Today for example, regular is 75.9 but everywhere else it is 71.4!

Esso here is always the same price as the other big gas stations. And their supreme formula is always 10 cents more than the price of regular while the others usually charge 11 cents more. :)

Quick_Lude... Ultramar charges only 8 cents more for Premium and 5 cents more on Thursday :)

Originally posted by Wing
Quick_Lude... Ultramar charges only 8 cents more for Premium and 5 cents more on Thursday :)
I can't remember the last time I saw an Ultramar gas station in the GTA.. they're rare.. Are they more prevalent in Ottawa? Or is that the only gas station in town? :p I keed, I keed! :D

LOL, there are not very many, actually mostly on the outskirts, I'm in Kanata and I know there is one in Stittsville and Carp (smaller towns west of Ottawa).

But IN Ottawa there isn't many. Anyway, there is one 2K from my home, closest one to my house and it's always the last one to raise prices which is nice, and it's the cheapest for premium.

And I seem to get be getting good mileage with the gas.

He he, there is one across the street from where I work (near the St-Laurent shopping center). I always fill up there.

Ok filled up again today as I found a station at 69.3 for regular.... 77.3 for supreme.

Anyway, I had exactly 160Km on the odo, put in 19.4 liters.

That's 12.1L/100Km this was ALL city driving. With a VERY short jaunt around the block hammering it at redline. Mostly I was driving with 3K shifts.

Looks like the EPA is right! Can't complain about that, can we?

423 kms, 45.1 l only hyghway cruising at 119 kph . 10.6 l per 100k

Not bad.....

That IS pretty good f1michel.

How many Km's have you got on your car when you did this fill-up ?

i am up there at 3200 km. Had the car 15 days now.... i know, i'm bad but i'm on vacation so cruising arounf PQ quite a bit.

Hey your on vac? Get to the tire shop! :D

The thing is Wing that i have 2 kids, a GF, tons of studying for an exams and at 44 it isn't as easy as at 24 to manage all this. ( well, the GF is easy...) Plus i have to return my leased Passat and have to have an appt with VW... ( i know, ranting..........)

i'll try to go in the next few days.

I was just keeding :) I figured you were busy. Canada also said he might go, but if you can go that's cool!

The sooner we know the better!

oh i know you were kidding :-)

475 km today... man i love that car.

I only put in sonoco 94 octance in my tank.

The dealer told me that Esso and Petro have High Sulfer in their gases.


Is this true ...?

Originally posted by Quick_lude
I finally remembered to get an application.. Not a huge fan of their regular and mid grade fuels, they have a lot of sulphur. For some reason the Supreme is low on sulphur though. Well, according to this data from 2002:
http://www.ene.gov.on.ca/envision/air/sig/2002.htm

Esso Supreme92 is not high in sulphur. The other grades are terrible.

Ultramar supreme is low in sulphur as well.... at least according to their website.

F1michel 475Km in 1 day, man your going to be at 100,000Km in NO TIME!

I will slow down a bit in the next few weeks i'm sure. I had to visit my parents 200 km away.

Originally posted by wakeech


...actually, the best method is to fill your tank right to the top ... and record your km's from there. then at your next fill up, see how much you have to put back in to get to full. you'll then have pretty darned accurate volume and very accurate distance numberes. because the volume number is so small, accuracy here is really where it counts, as error has a bigger effect on the ratio.

wakeech, I think you may have hit it on the head for a lot of these numbers people are showing up here with. If you fill up with only a few gallons/liters, just a small rounding error ( do people use the xx.xxx that I see printed out on gas tickets or just say "well that rounded off to xx or xx.x" ) or not filling to the exact same spot error can cause major mi-km/gal-l errors, also temperature plays a role in volume to fill a given space.

If your then using a mileage of >100 the error possibilities start to compound themselves. Result.. misleadingly and inncorrect gas useage numbers. Only flaw here is how come few if any are reporting like 25-30 mi/gal?