So, I bought my '17 EX-L V6 on Feb. 12th. I've got just over 2,500 miles on it, now. So far, I'm pretty impressed with the fuel mileage. I've been averaging about 33 to 34 mpg on my daily commute to and from work. It's roughly 90% highway but with mid to heavy traffic in the remaining 10% city driving.
I thought I'd try and see what I could get if I really tried.
I filled up on Apr. 14th and added 16.8 gallons. I filled up again this morning and I had gone 592 miles on the tank. The IMID shows a remaining range of 49 miles. It also shows trip A at 36.1 mpg. For the first 500 miles I was averaging 37.2 mpg but 2 nights last week, I got stuck in stop and go bumper to bumper traffic for an hour.
Although I didn't incorporate any hypermiling strategies, I did consciously drive as economically as I could, which is to say, I drove like an idiot for 600 miles. I did the best I could to not impede traffic in any way. My hwy speeds were between 65 and 70 mph. No jackrabbit starts, no flooring it, just slow and steady cruise. Windows rolled up, a/c off (most of the time). no cruise control (yes, I can out-economize the cruise control) Eco button on, S mode, never.
I don't know, I'm thinking I can probably get over 40 out on the open road, which is almost unthinkable in a V6 with this much power. I mean, that's Honda Fit territory.
Just so we're clear, this is not what V6's normally get, it's only what their "capable" of getting. Huge difference.
Last fill-up was 16.8 but this time it was considerably more, at 17.3. I know, the tank only holds 17.2 but I was able to do it with 2 or 3 gallons left in the tank. (49 mile range + reserve) I have a tendency to over-fill. Maybe my gas station is ripping me off? Anyway, I felt manual calculation wouldn't net a reliable figure.
That's very impressive for the V6. In comparison, I have a 2016 sport 6MT with 8,400 miles and lifetime average so for is at 22.0 mpg with a conservative driving style. I drive about 95% city and 5% highway. I can't really complain since advertised city mpg is 23 for the 2017 sport 6MT and 24 for the 2016s. I always assumed the I4 would always get better mpg than the V6. I know many factors affect mpg such as driving style, city/highway, heavy loads, steep hills, wind, wheel size, and transmission.
Another impessive thing is with all the highway driving you do, your oil change intervals will probably be at 7,000 to 8,000 miles. My MM was at 5% at 4,200 miles for my first oil change and I'm currently at 5% at 8,400 miles and due for my second oil change. My car is a year old, don't drive it much, mostly short trips and l have learned from other members that the MM will learn and adjust to your personal driving conditions.
Very nice. I'm experimenting with my current tank how good of mileage I can get with my 15 sport cvt. I have noticed that on highway driving, it's better to turn off econ, but turn on econ in around the town driving.
And I normally get even more than that with my 7th gen 6-6 sedan. :smile I normally get about 40-44 mpg on my usual highway commute.
My best ever trip is up to 47.1 mpg over about 45 miles, best tank is at 38.4. This is with extensive hypermiling techniques though, and several gas mileage mods.
Here was my best run with the "obsolete" V6. Road trip to Las Vegas and back in December. It was cold, below freezing for much of the drive home getting into the low 20s.
Honda wants to get rid of the V6 for a Turbo? :frown
I get about 17~20 MPG with mostly city driving and a heavy foot.
V6 doesn't do that well in city driving.
Honestly, I have reached that point where I just stopped caring about gas mileage. If I want to have good gas mileage, I would just sell the V6 Accord, get a Prius, and done. When I was buying the Accord, I also test drove a Prius(it's a Prius C, but still), and I still went with the Accord, knowing fully well that gas mileage will never be as good as a Prius. I am very willing to sacrifice fuel mileage for performance. Maybe I will do a hypermile run if I want to make a point, but I would never do it consistently. Just makes no sense to me, especially with mostly city driving and hilly highways.
I don't even have to try to get 30+ MPG on my Corolla. I can floor it at times and it still gets good gas mileage, but it will not give me the same satisfaction the V6 Accord gives me.
:grin @carguy1234 challenged me the same thing, except he actually listed an mpg target: 50 MPG. I'm so effing close! Just a few more mods and i'll be there.
That's pretty impressive. The V6 is a pig in the city though but if you keep it on the highway or even 40mph driving, it's pretty easy to keep it running on 3 cylinders only adding to the versatility of this engine. I do think aero has a lot to do with it too because 4 banger accords blow away 4 banger CRV's in the mpg department.
@carguy1234 challenged me the same thing, except he actually listed an mpg target: 50 MPG. I'm so effing close! Just a few more mods and i'll be there.
My '17 V6 is just a couple days old.
Yesterday wife and I got in car and took a Drive....mostly highway.
Got nearly 33 MPG according to the computer screen.
OP - great write up. And nice to see someone post V6 MPG results with the explanation of what's possible under ideal circumstances and what's realistic from a daily drive perspective. As opposed to the all-too-frequent "get a V6 and you can get 40 MPG!" misleading threads.
I really like how Honda has engineered their V6 - power when you want it (at a fuel economy price of course), impressive MPG on the highway.
I've posted this before, but no regrets on buying my 2015 6MT Sport. But if I were buying a '16 or '17, it would be a Touring.
I got 40 mpg as an experiment in my V6. It was a 135 mile round trip. 95% highway. From my experience, I would say even 45 is possible.
The restrictions needed to get those numbers included the following:
A) my foot was off the gas long before I ever needed to stop. I barely used the brakes at all.
B) I never exceeded 62 MPH the entire trip.
C) my acceleration times from 0-60 when I did have to stop may have exceeded 2 minutes.
D) I had the Econ on and the A/C compressor off
E) I doubt I used more than 20 hp at any time during this entire trip.
If you are doing 100% highway on flat terrain, cruise control at 65 will easily attain 40 mpg if it's a 60+ degree day with light winds on a dry roadway (A/C off, windows up, sunroof closed)
I think 45 mpg or more is attainable under those same conditions at 50 mph.
Ok, admittedly it's not easy to get 40+ mpg, but it can be done.
But even more amazing than that, I find that a long highway trip at 75 mph with relatively "normal" driving will often net 30 mpg.
I agree with you for the most part. If you do mostly highway driving, that could make sense, but with mostly city driving, V6 Accord will NOT have any chance against a hybrid. There is no way you can beat the gas mileage of a Prius in city, but with some trick it can be done on the highway - Prius gets worse gas mileage on highway due to the fact that it has to run the engine constantly on the highway, whereas the electric motors take care of the stop and go traffic.
I care more about smiles per gallon personally. It's nice to hear the V6 roar, and it keeps everything clean of carbon deposits, which is not as big of a concern with highway driving.
While I don't have the V6 accord, before my I4 Accord, I had a 2013 VW Passat TDI. I averaged about 41MPG over 52,000 miles. My best tank ever was 50.2MPG. I averaged 620 miles between fillips. My two longest tanks were 825 miles and 834 miles. It's a darn shame that car was hit while parked and totaled. And with the VW diesel fiasco, I couldn't get another new one.
On my 2016 EX-L with the I4-CVT, over 14,000 miles, I am averaging 31.1MPG. That's living in Michigan, running snow tires over the winter, and driving a lot of urban/city driving. I always drive in ECO mode. I am averaging 428 miles between fillips. My two longest tanks were 530 miles and 531 miles. On the 531 mile tank, I only got 15.7 gallons of fuel in it. So, I still had 1.5 gallons of fuel remaining. Which means I could have done 560 miles or so on that tank. My last two tanks have been 34.8MPG and 33.8MPG.
What I love about my Accord is that my Trip computer average is spot on. It's always within .2MPG of my calculations with Fuelly.
The trip computer isn't always 100% reliable. The car is capable of more than 34 mpg because I was in mountainous terrain for half the tank. If you maintained a steady 60mph cruise on flat ground, I'm sure 35mpg or more would be quite possible.
Yeah, I occasionally see 41ish on my 30 mile commute to work. However, my single trips don't really match my full tank MPG's. Lately I've been getting around ~33-34 on my I4 on the tank as a whole.
I have never broken 40 mpg while consistently running the A/C. I can use A/C in limited situations for free if I have to slow down anyways, but having it on all the time DESTROYS my mileage. I can't get much better than 35 mpg with A/C, but then again, the trips where I use A/C are also trips with whiny passengers that don't tolerate full on hypermiling. That and they are more city based routes.
The air conditioner draws its power from the engine which uses some gas, but with today's cars, this use of gas is minute. The air conditioner can decrease the fuel economy of your car up to 20% in some vehicles, but it depends on the type. Driving with the air conditioner is more fuel efficient than driving with the windows down. Driving with the windows down creates drag which means that your engine has to work harder to keep your car at the current speed; this burns more gas than if you just ran your air conditioner.
In the long run, using your air conditioner is far better than any other means of cooling yourself off in the car, unless you're driving in traffic. When you drive in traffic you aren't going very fast so the drag on the car is minimal. In these cases, you burn more fuel running the air conditioner than having the windows down. That makes sense. When you drive on the highway you can use either the air conditioner or the "window down" method to cool yourself, because, honestly, there is no noticeable difference in gas usage at those speeds.
The best defense against decreasing fuel economy is actually pretty simple – use your windows at lower speeds, and turn on the air when you hit the highway. Of course, open windows increase drag, which also reduces fuel economy, but the impact isn’t as great as running the AC at lower speeds.
So, it seems my method of having the windows down in traffic jams is logical.
And it doesn't seem the MPG can affected much by the A/C, if the simple act of having the windows down at 65 MPH is putting more load on the engine than the A/C would...especially if the A/C isn't even running at 65 MPH in some cars.
I wonder what the engine load values will look like with the windows all the way down vs. the A/C on. I'll check that and the HP. The engine load is even more twitchy than the HP and fuel flow so it'll be interesting.
I was skeptical that I could crack 30 MPG in my 14 6-6, but I was bored on my last road trip and decided to see what happens with eco mode on. Even with a few hard 3/4 gear passes thrown in, I managed a best of 36.75 MPG. Average was 34 MPG. This was traveling with no A/C on and at speeds of approximately 70-75 MPH overall. Unbelievable. Made it from one province to another in under one tank of gas.
Best I've ever gotten in the '15 was 28.55mpg in these conditions: 87 octane, 71-74 degrees, running 74-79mph, half on cruise control, with a good 10-15mph+ tail wind - computer said 29.4. (Yes, I do log conditions in my gas spreadsheet when I attempt to see what kind of mpg I can attain - I run the same 230 mile trip often, so its easy to fill right before and after I pull on/off the freeway)
I have no idea how you'd get 36+ in a 9th gen 6-6 unless you were keeping it well below 70mph with a serious tail wind.
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