Low 30's?

[nitroblaster]

Hey everyone I just got my insight after trading in my new beetle 2 weeks ago. I'm only about to hit the 500 mile mark but i'm still concerned that i'm only at a 33MPG average. I live in NYC and its been pretty cold, Econ on 75% of the time. Is this a break-in issue, what tire pressure should I look for? Other than that I love the car so far! Thanks for your help

[noseph]

I have had my new I2 for 2 weeks tomorrow. I am north of Boston and after my initial sitting in the driveway with the engine running checking out my new toy, I have been getting around 42mpg on the MID. I have left my tire pressures at 33 (I did need to set them the second day I had the car and the outside temp had dropped near zero). I have not turned Econ off at all. I am coming from 9 years of driving a 5spd manual I1.

[bish79]

Originally Posted by nitroblaster

Hey everyone I just got my insight after trading in my new beetle 2 weeks ago. I'm only about to hit the 500 mile mark but i'm still concerned that i'm only at a 33MPG average. I live in NYC and its been pretty cold, Econ on 75% of the time. Is this a break-in issue, what tire pressure should I look for? Other than that I love the car so far! Thanks for your help

If you are in NYC I am guessing that you make alot of short trips in alot of stop and go situations. This combined with cold temperatures will kill your MPG (by kill, I mean you'll get low 30's, where any other car would get mid to high 20's).

Once the weather warms up you should see some improvement, but you may never get spectacular results due to your specific driving conditions (unless you get out of the city once in a while).

[leonar40]

Search on this site as there are many threads on techniques for improving mpg, such as running tires at 40-45 psi, etc. The previous poster has some pretty good advice as well. The IMA system is not as well suited for stop-go driving as Toyota's hybrid system, so don't expect your city numbers to be higher than your highway numbers like it would be on a Prius. A lot of people that I know make that mistake. But ya basically the cold weather kills mileage!