First Post, need guidence
 

Hello Everyone!!

This forum is awesome! Tons of useful information and experience to be gleaned from it. I'v had my 8 now for one week, and i really WANT to love this car. I love the exterior, love the interior, handling i superb.HOWEVER, the fuel economy I am not loving so much. I've gotten just 200 miles per tank regardless of city or highway driving. The car only has 545 miles on her. The dealership nazis "swear" that over time it will get better. Is that true? How much better?

Like I said I really want to fully embrace this awesome machine, but if this gas situation doesn't improve, I'm about 2 heartbeats away from getting out of my lease on this thing. Surely there is something I can do/can be done. Please, please help me out here guys.

Your mileage will get better.
Make sure that have the newest flash - "M"


Here is the bulletin http://www.finishlineperformance.com...1-04-1273d.pdf


If your VIN # is within that range get your car reflashed. I noticed a pretty good increase in gas mileage and the smoothnes of the powerband.

200 mile per tank is good! i have only got 200 miles on a tank once out of like 6 fillups :/

You've got to be kidding me!!! That's good, i might as well be driving a damn fork lift or something. The tank holds 16 gallons of fuel (15.9) thats 12.8 miles per gallon???? Man... This is not good. I had no idea this little 1.3 liter engine was soooooooo thirsty. Come on guys, there's got to be something. What if I add a k/n or something, or ge that BB exhaust,, something

The break-in period eats a lot of fuel. Be patient.

I got the M flash and installed the Borla a day apart. I noticed a decent increase in mileage. I just hit the 10,000 mile mark in 3 months - mileage gets better

The low fuel warning light comes on a little after 13 gallons.

I only got 200 on my first tank as well. After some more driving it went to about 240 per tank. Now after 10000 miles it gets around 270 per tank, though I doubt it will get any better than that.

Adding the intake didn't do anything for fuel efficiency either. Just let the engine break in and loosen up a little.


edit: by "tank" i mean per fill-up from "low fuel warning" - generally 13.5gal.

well,,
 

I guess there is light at the end of the tunnel, albeit a rather dim one. Thanks for the help guys. If anyone else has anything to add, please don't hesitate.

You can't really compute gas mileage by the tank. How many gallons did you put in at 200 miles? Unless you ran for quite a while with the low fuel light on, you probably only added 13 or so. That comes out to a little over 15 MPG. That's still not great but it will get better. I started out around 16 MPG, but now with a little over 11,000 miles, I usually get around 20-21 and that's mostly around town. I haven't taken it our for a long trip since I got the M reflash done. Since yours only has a little over 500 miles on it, the reflash was probably done before you picked it up.

I CAN GET WELL OVER 300 MILES ON ALL HIGHWAY DRIVING. MY MOST RECENT TRIP I GOT 23 MPG DRIVING @80MPH MOST OF THE TRIP. MAKE SURE ON THE HIGHWAY YOU ACTUALLY USE 6TH.

My car started off around 15 mpg and it has slowly improved, but I'm still only getting about 17 mpg at the 7000 mile mark.

Note: this is 80% city driving and I don't have the L or M flash yet.

Re: well,,
 

Brian, the thing I can add is: do the math! Don't judge by how many miles to the tank - because that is only accurate if you run the tank dry! Take the number of miles driven since the last fillup divided by the number of gallons to fill it up. That will give you your true mpg. Gas gauges and low-fuel level indicators will vary - so rely on the math which won't lie.

Your mileage will improve as your total miles increase. I was getting 15-16 mpg when it was new. That improved to 17-18 in mixed driving when I had 1000-2000 miles on it. Now, with 9000 miles, I am getting 18-19 in suburban driving, and 23-25 on pure highway driving.

Break the car in properly early on, and it will pay big dividends later with good mileage and high reliability and longevity.

I've generally gotten 14-15 commuting and 21-22 on highway and have about 7K miles. Just came back from PA mountains, though, and was up to 175 miles at the half-full mark! With AC on and cruising 70 - 80. (Admittedly it is mostly downhill but things do seem to be getting better and exhaust mods may be helping ....)

I'd add the same point - a "tank" is NOT a unit of measure, unless you're running it empty each and every time. Calculate the damn miles per gallon!!!

There's plenty of threads, old and recent, that discuss this - we always point out that the gas mileage does indeed improve as the car gets broken in. There's also plenty of threads discussing what mileage people are getting long term.

Regards,
Gordon

You are missing the point! Did you ever thought that this little 1.3lt engine has the same horsepower as a 3lt one? So what did you expect? To use fuel like a Golf? C'mon!
It might even consume more than a 3lt engine when driven hard, but you can't just ask everything from a car that good!

Oh, and like Z owners say: there's nothing you can do about it. Just accept it and be happy with it. When people tried to convince me NOT to buy this car they told me "you'll need gas every 300km top". When I found out that I can do well over 450km with one tank, I was soooo happy about it! :) .....and even happier that I didn't follow their advise!

yes the gas mileage isnt the best, but you drive the car for 2 months and you won't care about it as much as you do right now... i think mazda knew the gas mileage issue wouldnt be a problem when they learned how unique and FREAKIN fun this car is!!! but good luck

ok ok
 

Well, all of you have made very strong arguments indeed. To be honest, I am guilty of using a tank as a unit of measure, so now I too will keep a log and get more acurate results. I do love the car already, I was just freaking out initially that I may not be able to afford to drive the thing. Thanks all for the imparted wisdom. Anyone else?

Re: ok ok
 

Its easy to be fooled by that - the tank in the 8 is on the smallish side, so it tends to run empty faster than you'd expect. Your mileage will improve - you'll see that when you start calculating it.

I noticed from your "location" that you are banished to Montana. Hmmm, aren't there some roads out there without speed limits? - I hardly call that banishment with the RX-8 - I call it HEAVEN!

I get around 185 miles on a tank before the light comes on. Added K&N & Borla with absolutely zero change in gas mileage. All city driving. The one time I took it on a short highway trip I hit 240 before the light came on and that tank was only about 30% highway so highway driving seems to make a huge difference.
I have not figured out my exact gas mileage due to the fact that it is really not that important to me right now because the car is so much fun to drive.
Zoom zoom!

Re: Re: ok ok
 

I noticed from your "location" that you are banished to Montana. Hmmm, aren't there some roads out there without speed limits? - I hardly call that banishment with the RX-8 - I call it HEAVEN! [/B][/QUOTE]


Nope, the no speed limit thing went out the window about 8 years ago. Montana legislature finally figured out how much revenue they were missing out on. The kind of ok thing is if you get a ticket, it's usually 20 or 40 dollars over, and you can pay it on the spot.

Wow, I'm happy to see the posts of mileage improving over time. I think some of it is also getting used to the car, IMO it's too easy to run in 4th or 5th on the freeway and not even notice the higher rpms cause the engine is so quiet and the power so even. I try to watch a little more closely and not step on it too much. I've averaged 18 mpg for the last 2000 miles (1 month). I have yet to take it on a long drive so I don't really know what strictly highway will give me. Hang in there a little longer, 500 miles is barely enough to get used to driving the car.