'03 VUE gas milage

I have a 2003 4 cyl. FWD VTi VUE with 5400 miles on it. It is averaging 19.8
mpg, mostly local driving. Peak milage was 20.8 mpg. However, my '93 SW-2
does a hell of a lot better (25.8) over the same course. This really sucks.
Anyone else having this problem?

Whitey

 

I have a 2003 Vue with 4 cyc. FWD and I get 22 city and we just got back
from a trip that I got 26.5 on it. Ran air all the way and my spped was an
average 70 mph.
I try to use the same type of gas, Mobil, so maybe that is why.

Ed

PS: My Vue has 15000 miles on it now.

 

I have a 2003 Vue V6 AWD with about 6K miles on it. I'm SUPPOSED to
get 19 city and 25 highway, according to the EPA stats on the sticker.

In actuality I get about 13 city and 19 highway, and have been since I
purchased the car in November. All weather conditions, all driving
conditions, with a/c and without a/c, I consistently average 6 mpg
under what I =should= be getting.

I've been back and forth with the service department, around and
around with the service manager, done test after test, and they can't
find a thing wrong with the car. The dealership is genuinely trying to
figure something out, but Customer Service in Tennessee was
extraordinarily unhelpful and surly (yes, surly). After agreeing that
my mileage is an abberation, but unable to find a cause, they told me
in so many words "since we can't find anything wrong there's nothing
to fix so you'll just have to learn to live with it".

Huh??????

So what it comes down to is Saturn is lying to the public by
drastically overestimating the mileage as stated on the sticker in
order to sell more cars, and when confronted with the discrepancy,
says "learn to live with it".

This is currently an ongoing process, my next step is to sit down and
talk to the dealership manager and then the regional manager. I will
invoke California's Lemon Law if I have to, but they've got to do
something about this. It's just not right.

Cathy

 

Not that I have much faith in my government these days... I wonder if the
EPA site (down for maintenance Sunday night from 8-10 EDT) would have any
resources, or at least the ability to register a complaint.

13 mpg's is a little rough for a small SUV in my humblest opinion...

re: www.epa.gov

 

That's fairly unusual. I don't know how you drive - very lead-footed driving
habits will definitely reduce the gas mileage.

Also, how are you calculating your fuel economy? Most accurate way is to
fill the tank up till the pump shuts off (do not "top off"), reset the trip
odometer, drive it, then refill the tank till it shuts off, divide the
mileage on the trip odometer by the amount of gas you just put in.

 

My driving habits are pretty conservative - I'm not a lead-foot nor do
I indulge in jackrabbit starts. I always let the car warm up for a
couple of minutes in the morning. And yes, that's precisely how I've
always calculated my gas mileage for the past 30 years, and how I've
been doing it with my Vue. The service manager even agreed to a test -
they filled up my car from their pumps, noted my mileage, I drove the
car as I normally do for a week or so, brought the car back to them
when I had about 1/4 tank left, for them to fill up. I kept careful
track of every mile I drove on that tank, and it came out to 55%
highway and 45% city. By =their= calculations I got 15.4 miles per
gallon on that tank. Again, the only thing I did in all that driving
that might reduce the mileage was drive with the a/c on (it's July in
Los Angeles, you can't drive without it!). I'll allow a mile or so
falloff for using the a/c, but not 6. Something is just not right.

And this is the test result that Customer Service told me I had to
"learn to live with".

Not only that, I have a friend who bought an identical Vue the same
day I did (2003 V6 AWD. Only difference between hers and mine is
color). I made her calculate her mileage during the time I was doing
the test. Most of her driving is heavily congested freeway driving,
and she averaged 24.3 miles per gallon. Which makes me believe there
=is= something wrong with my car, but nobody can figure out what.

Cathy

 

My 03 FWD with stick gets 25mpg mixed city/highway (lots of stop lights)
when I run the air, and 27mpg when I don't run the air for the whole tank. I
haven't done a tank totally on the interstate, but I'm hoping for 30+. I
know the cvi is supposed to get the same gas mileage as the manual, so I
would guess that the cvi belt is slipping too much or something. With as
little "zip" as this suv has, it should get pretty good gas mileage. I'm
very happy with my VUE.

 

How many miles are on this vehicle right now? More than 20000??

 

Two minutes once a day is not going to make the kind of difference I'm
seeing.
Cathy

 

Yes, we do have a lemon law in California. And that is going to be my
next step, but I'm afraid I'm going to get an argument. Gas mileage is
so subjective that they (I'm sure) will argue that the mileage I'm
getting isn't grounds for invoking the lemon law. I've already had
them quote to me that they don't sent the mileage ratings, that's the
EPA who does it, thereby implying that they don't have to stand behind
those ratings (again, this was from the surly Customer Service rep in
Tennessee). It's going to get ugly I bet.
Cathy

 

Perhaps you want to let the engine get broken in

I had the same problem when I first got mine...mileage sucked. But now it
has increased to about 24 mpg. I now have over 20000 miles on it.

Trust me, it helps.

 

I think after 9 months and 6500 miles the engine is sufficiently
broken in.
Cathy

 

Not so. As the engine continues to break in it will get better mileage.
Some other things you might want to look at as well that are all
correctable:

Tires (underinflated, I inflate all to 35PSI)
Spark Plugs/Wires
Gasoline Quality
Brakes (possibly sticking or riding brake pedal)
Engine Oil (10W-30 or 10W-40 heavier = worse mileage from 5W-30)
Thermostat (opening too soon or too low temperature = inefficient)
Transmission (automatic or shifting late)

Good luck.

Bob

 

....and honestly 2 minutes is not needed. Just light the thing off in the
morning and immediately hit the road (take it easy the first couple of
blocks). It's not like a old carbureted V8 engine of yesteryear. My 2
cents...

I thought I heard a car idling using about a cup a minute of fuel - I blew
it on the last pints to quarts calc I attempted - so will someone smarter
than me do the math and see how much a "Couple" minutes of idling would
actually consume fuel wise?

Also, does it fully warm up (as explained in the user manual)? If it's
running cold (via a defective sensor) the computer is going tell the
injectors to make the engine run rich (using excessive gasoline too).

 

When I first start the car in the morning it idles at about 1300rpm.
After about a minute or so the idle drops down to it's normal rate of
600-700rpm. This is what I was referring to as "warming up".
Cathy

 

Idle warmup wastes fuel; in most circumstances, immediately driving
away gently is more effective at warming up the engine, while getting
more than 0mpg. If you have extreme cold conditions that require idle
warmup for your vehicle, you probably shouldn't expect good fuel economy
anyway.

 

....that makes sense - just don't wait for the idle to drop, instead put the
selector in gear and go - plus the car will warm up faster being under load
(driving) versus sitting in the driveway idling.

 

Is the temperature gauge getting up to where it should be (not sure on this
car, but probably close to the middle of the range)?

Though, quite likely if it weren't warming up you'd get the Check Engine
light on eventually with a trouble code for "coolant temperature below
thermostat regulating temperature"..

 

or you are a knob

 

Most cars would have to be going 70 to 90 mph to burn a cup a minute.
1c/min = 1 gal/16min At 25mi/gal, that would be 25miles/16min =
93.75mph (although the car might not get 25 mpg at 93.) I would
guestimate that a car would burn less than one tenth that much fuel on
a cold idle, maybe a lot less. That would be 0.1c/min or .00625
gal/min. If she cold idles it 20 times for 2 min each on each tank
she would be using an extra 0.25gal at the most.