I've always kept fairly meticulous records on fuel usage, so on the occasion of my recent transition from my 2005 PW/B MC to a new 2011 SO/W MCS I thought it would be interesting to look back on my fuel usage over the life of my beloved ex-MINI -- at least, during my term of ownership. The results are shown in the graph below.

One interesting fact is that my best fuel economy of 39.5 mpg just so happened to occur while zipping around the mountain twisties of Colorado during MITM3. I guess mountain motoring maximizes fuel efficiency. A potential marketing tool as yet unexploited by the MINI5280 folks?

I suppose there are some other interesting statistics that could potentially be mined from these data, but for now here is the MPG history for you to ponder and draw your own conclusions.

Edit: I should point out that prior to the summer of 2007, a majority of the miles represented commuting to work around the Capital Beltway with its more-than-occasional stop-and-go traffic; after relocating to IA at the end of '07 most of my driving was on the open road and became increasingly more so (notice the smaller variance over the last few seasons in the graph) but mostly done using E10 fuel since it's the only available premium fuel in town. I suspect my MPG suffered a couple of numbers due to both influences.

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Are you sporting a new color?

 

Yep, you noticed.

 

Very nice, Now the mods begin all over again? Did you order or just pick one off the lot?

 

I noticed the same thing! I have a 2006 Cooper convertible that I got in March 2009. I started keeping track of mileage in July and went to MITM in August '09. Here's my chart. The spike (38.7 MPG) was the day I drove up Mt Evans! I consistantly got better gas mileage in the mountains. The low point was when I used my car to deliver papers for 2 weeks.

 

PM sent.

That is amazing and certainly not a coincidence; and I'm glad to see corroborating evidence on the excellent mountain fuel economy. I think most people haven't believed me when I've made that claim in the past.

Thanks for sharing your data!

(How 'bout them Badgers? )

 

Well, I don't have a fancy chart but my gas mileage has extremely suffered over the past couple months. But let's set the "Way Back Machine" for Sept. 2008. My MINI was a couple weeks old and I took a run to Arkansas to see my folks and show off my new baby. I was sporting 35mpg at 75mph. (average)
After the new car usgae wore off my avg. mpg dropped to 32mph by Nov of 2011. This past December I was trying to set turn signal blink time and in the process reset my avg. mpg. Now my avg is 22-23mpg. I think mainly due to
A LOT of short trip city driving. I need to hit the open road and get that mpg back up. That's my beans on this subject.

 

I had the same experience in Colorado's mountains, using Shell fuel. Molly, my 2007 MCS, got a steady 40 mpg.