There's "up to 10% ethanol" in gas all over, I thought. Seems like it didn't take long for that sticker to show up on gas pumps, once "regular" leaded gas was no longer available, way back when... Maybe it's a large market thing though... I was in western Illinois watching bald eagles (400 mile road trip, wanted to take the MINI since it would have knocked out a BUNCH of break-in miles, but we went in the Caravan instead) and we re-fueled at a gas station that was straight out of the 60's.... no slot for your debit card, and analog displays for "gallons" and "$"... what a trip.

The eagles (we saw hundreds of them) were awesome, and i am still wondering about "winter gas" if anyone knows,
Tatt

 

This was my excuse for getting my MINI too. But my other car is an F150 truck that only gets about 11 MPG. Even with that the gas savings is really only enough to pay for the difference in insurance costs (I still have the F150 so have ins on both)

It is great tho to buy gas and spend $30.00 instead of $65.00!!!

 

Most of the mileage on my '04 MCS is in W.LA and the Valley, and most of that is stoplight to stoplight. My mileage also equals my average speed. According to the computer I'm getting 20-21 mpg for average speed of 22. Computing the mileage myself brings it down closer to 19 mpg. Yuck.

On the other hand, when I can get out of the city and do some sustained driving, even canyon carving, my MPG goes up to the upper 20's. My longest highway trip averaged about 30.
You're within the accepted, if not appreciated, range for heavy stop light driving. <sigh>

 

My friend (who lives in San Francisco) and I both got our 05 MCSes within a month of each other.. He has ~5K miles and gets about 21mpg mixed street/hwy and I have ~2K and get 19-21mpg (85% street/15% hwy) in LA/OC. The most common question asked by onlookers, friends, family, etc. is "How many miles to the gallon does it get?" I'm almost embarrassed to tell them!

 

My car (with 45,000 miles) at this point is fairly modded(see sig).My 66 mile round trip commute is a mixture of highway and little traveled twisty back roads that I drive rather spiritedly ( at 4:30 AM) .My average speed is around 35 and my mileage hovers around 27 most of the time.I use shell "v power", 93 octane .

 

Ah this is pretty funny. I will keep putting "help a girl out" in the title of my topics! Let me know if you want me to start any others!!!!

So much great info here - thanks everyone

VEGAS here I come!!!!! I hope everyone is signing up for the Friday dinner

Oh another excuse to get the new wheels and tires I want

Thanks again everyone!

 

I have a 2002 MCS, also very modded, and I am getting the same mileage as minhune.

 

Jam down hard on the gas pedal... smile...squeel the tires...make everybody's head turn...don't sweat the MPG! The MINI is for fun, not economy!


I average about 25-29 MPG mixed city/freeway (heavy on the city), and about 35 MPG freeway only. The OBC says I get about 3 MPG while peeling away from the intersections!

 

You've got a really good point there!

 

i agree with the comments of traffic patterns. rolling parking lots will drop your mpg while no traffic and constant spped will improve it.

now, i bought a used early 04 with 4,600 miles and nows has 5,500 miles.

i drive a combination of 55mpg zones and town driving conditions. i've noticed my mpg varies depending on the gear selection. it seems to be better if you keep the engine around 3k rpm. when i have a choice between say forth and fifth where fourth runs just above 3k rpm and fifth would run about 2.7k rpm the computer tells me that i'm getting about 1mpg better in fourth running the higher rpms. i know this seems contrary to what would be expected but, i ran one tank of gas using higher rpm's and one tank running the next higher gear and lowers rpm's. there was about 1.5mpg better in the lower gear/higher rpm's. i wonder if running the higher gear/lower rpm below 3k is in essence lugging the engine whereby the engine is using sag less effiecently.

 

My attitude has been to forget about gas mileage, especially with a 15% and GIAC. However, after two and a half years I finally decided to try driving conservatively for one tank of gas to see what effect it would have. I shifted religiously at 3,000 rpm no matter what gear I was in....... instead of my usual 4,000-4,500 rpm. My previous tank averaged 20.2 mph and this one finished at 23.2 mpg. While my mpg increased significantly...it wasn't anywhere near as much fun driving my Mini.

Today, I'm right back trading better gas mileage for the fun of real
motoring!

 

I have a stock 05 MCS and live in LA too. I get around 21 MPG

 

Well there's your cause. I average closer to 24-25 even with lots of performance mods, but I notice my mileage goes down a mpg per 5-10 mph of average speed. That said, my average speed usually runs in the mid 30's to low 40's and most of my driving is local (off highways). However, when my avg speed gets into the low 30's, my mpg will usually read lower at around 22-23mpg.

Now if I had a Cooper and was only averaging 22, then I'd be pissed. But the lead leg must explain it.

 

I routinely drive 385-415 miles on a tank (12.5-12.9gal) in my '04 Cooper.
My last four fillups were a constistant 31.1-.3mpg.

About 80% of my driving is on DC's Beltway with cruise @ 68mph.
The other 20% is either slow city driving, else *****-to-the-wall pedal-to-the-floor sprints from stoplights (or excessive speeding).

Best econ readout on my OBC was 42.0avg on a short 15 mile trip.
Actual best, full tank, was 34.5mpg on a long 440mile trip.
--Chris

 

I've never had a car that had as much disparity between its city and highway gas milage.

I don't use my MINI for commute, so that's not an issue for me. When I drive for *fun* I don't worry about gas milage. When I'm traveling distances on the open freeway the milage is pretty good. I made one trip from the California/Oregon border to the SF bay area on one tank of gas, with an *indicated* mpg of over 36.

 

i was told recently that if you let the RPMs reach slightly over 3000 then shift up, then your MPG will increase. This seems counter productive, but it actually brought my MPG up 2-3 miles. I was surprised. I have a 2004 MCS with 8500 miles on it, with the computer saying i average about 23 and i have a relatively heavy foot. Good luk with this and let me know if you figure out anything good to improve mileage.

 

It has to do with that supercharger. When you're cruising, there's a bypass valve that basically bypasses the supercharger, and you're more or less running on vacuum, like a normally aspirated, fuel-injected car. (IE, like a non-S MINI Cooper.)

Stomp on the gas, and the bypass valve opens. (Or does it close?) You go into the "boost zone" and your supercharger starts packing air into the cylinders and the injectors squirt in a lot more fuel to go with all that air! Your power goes way up, but the gas mileage goes way down.

Back in the "good ole days" of carburetors, the rule of thumb was to never press the gas pedal quickly enough to engage the acceleration jets or deeply enough to engage the secondaries. Kinda the same thing here, except it's boost you're trying to avoid.

 

Every engine has a "sweet spot" where you get most power coming out for the least amount of fuel going in. Small, highly tuned, "peaky" motors like ours tend to have relatively high sweet spots. Shift too early, and you're lugging the engine - you have to give it more gas to get it to accelerate. Shift too late, and you're just wasting gas.

I tend to shift around that point you're talking about. But I have also found that once I get up to my "cruising speed" (ie, I'm not accelerating any more), I can usually improve my mpg by shifting up one more gear. This would definitely be in the "lugging" range if I were still accelerating, but for cruising, it seems more economical.

I ordered my MCS with the OBC (on board computer), and usually leave it on "average consumption." It's fun to play with this!

 

It closes. Afterall, it is the bypass valve. So opening the valve bypasses the supercharger. At full boost, the bypass valve should be fully closed (so that no air bypasses the supercharger).

 

Thanks for clarifying!

 

Let's think about it:

2 HP per cubic inch
pump gas
smooth idle
drivable under all road conditions
18,000 miles on the car

I am only getting 25.1 average miles per gallon....

What is wrong with that?


Bear

 

I don't get the 2 HP per cubic
I have 40K miles
But the rest is the same,except I get mid 30's MPG
Nothing wrong with that

 

THere you go you answered your own question. When I was working locally I drove it in the city only no freeway and I got the same milage as you. actually worse... i got 16.8 to 18... but then when I switched jobs and had a 30 mile commute down the 710 I'm now getting 26 to 28 MPG per tank depending on traffic comming home and if I run AC or not.

SOoooo to answer your question I too thought somthing was wrong with my car at first when I got LOW milage in city driving but I'm pretty sure its normal.

 

You're getting 25.1 mpg? I'll tell you what's wrong with that - you aren't on it enough!

 

DC area driving last week; I495, I66, I95 (speeds 65-105 mph) plus 100 miles of Blue Ridge Parkway (aka Skyline Drive) twisties (35-45 mph) was able to go 425 distance on 12.25 fillup.

425/12.25 = 34.7 MPG !

'04 MC, K&N + Tornado FuelSaver, Mobil1 + ProLong & Zmax additives