I drove back from Lake Powell to Salt Lake City, Utah yesterday and it showed 31.8 MPG on the trip on my 2002 SE 6-speed. I had the cruse control set to 80 mph and only passed a couple of cars on the two lane highway portion of the trip. On the way down was a different story 24.1 with an average speed of 95 on the trip meter. Top speed for the trip 135 with 4 total people and trunk loaded. Not bad. The fastest and best MPG car I've ever owned.

 

remember, the computer is generally off by about 3 or 4 MPG.

 

my best mpg is like 20.5

 

on the highway? my best is around 22 or 23 on the highway

 

If you guy's are wondering if my trip computer is off then this will help you out. I went 300 miles on a little over a half a tank.

 

you wanna trade our cars? half tank = 150miles

 

Yeah, I heard some Canadian spec models made it here (they show kilometers/gallon, not MPG). Seriously, I think there's a TSB on it.

 

Nah it's not in kilometers. I've gotten mine to read over 32mpg after burning a full tank, but then when I actually fill up it's only about 27mpg. So yeah, the computer is just trying to make you feel better about yourself.

 

How many miles on your car?

I'm at 1300 miles and my mileage still sucks badly. I had the cruise set on 75mph on a short trip, gently accelerated at all times, did not pass a single car and the trip still only showed 30.5 mpg which was probably more like 26.5 mpg. My last tank the trip said 26.5 and the actual mileage was 22.2 and that was half city - half highway. I am enjoying the torque and power and all but my CL-S with intake and headers got 21mpg in the city and 30mpg on the highway with a lead foot!!

The CL's worst ever mileage was 27mpg on the highway heading into a 20mph headwind. By comparison, my friend following me in a Saturn SL1 got only 28mpg!!! Following a friend in a U-Haul that was goverened to 65mph I once got 34.5mpg in the CL-S!

Oh well. I've been lucky up til now... every car I've ever owned has gotten 2-3mpg better than the sticker.

 

Well, kiss my grits. I've got the 3.0 and avg 20mpg w/ hard driving. Best was 23 on a road trip (~75mph). What gives?

 

some US cars were reading in KM traveled instead of miles traveled but if his car was reading in KM instead of miles it would tell him like 45 MPG instead of 31.

2002MaximaSE:
i cant prove that your computer is off but EVERYONE else's is. you said you got 300 miles on half a tank. the needle that points to 1/2 tank isnt totally on the money either. fill up the tank and divide the total # of gallons put in on that fill up and divide it bu the # of miles traveled since last time you filled up.

still, you were probably getting around 28 MPG which is definitely better than i have been getting.

 

I regularly get over 420 miles per tank.... and it's not totally empty, either. All highway to work and back, no racing, very few stops.

 

Wow!

 

Well put. Just b/c the needle points to the halfway point, doesn't mean you have exactly 1/2 a tank left. I know some gas guzzlers like Caddys tell you it's on E (and the light comes on) when you still have like 6 gallons left, while cars with better fuel consumption will go to E when you have maybe 3 gallons left.

 

Why does everyone accept the trip computer is off by 4 or 5 MPG? I owned a Eagle Vision TSI, and I could take the trip computer to the bank. Would you all accept the clock gains 5 hours per day? This was a feature sold with the car, if I'm not mistaken part of an option package. If it doesn't work, have them fix it or return part of the purchase price.

 

Just finished a 2400 mile round trip. at rpm's of 2000/2200,gas mpg was30/31/32 0n interstate. 28 mpg with air conditioing on.this was with vary careful, toping off each tankfull.trip computer off a consistant 6 mpg.any thing over 70 mph milage drops consirdable.

 

You really should get it checked out,my 5 spd gets 26-27mpg on highway, and I drive like a maddmaxx. Anywhere from 65mph to 100mph all the time. If I set the cruise on at 65 mph, who knows, that will never happen.Good luck.......

 

It has proven that it is inaccurate. The milege in my Volvo with the trip computer was dead on, in the Maxima it is highly optimistic. The best way to figure out milage is fiil up the car, reset the trip meter, drive, fill up and see how far you went. The trip computer on my Max (including most others on this board) is not accurate. No (very few) Nissan dealers would take your word on face value that the trip computer is inaccurate--would have to prove it. Refund part of the purchase price hahahahahah.....

 

resetting odo to zero, refilling tank (same gas station) and dividing odo mileage by fuel pumped into tank, best I've obtained is 313 miles on 13.1 gallons or 23.9 mpg and that's on 60% city and 40% rural back road driving -some of it moderately spirited.

 

*Laughing* Hasn't worked for anyone else. My dealer denied any other complaints.

At 9K miles, my mpg still sucks. Maybe 70/30 highway/city, and I have not yet gotten over 350 miles out of the "tank." Trip comp is consistently 4mpg off. Just normal driving....

I would have to call BS on 300 miles anywhere near 1/2 a tank. Unless it was downhill, with a tailwind, drafting a Kenworth.

I still grit my teeth thinking of the Albuquerque to Phoenix on 1 tank commercial....

 

465 on one tank. Not unbelievable (18.5 Gallon Tank - 465/18.5 = 25 MPG)

I went 420 on a tank once but I was very bored.

 

Don't think I can get 300 miles on the half tank. I drove around the city until I was almost empty after the trip. I had 452 miles on the tank and put 15.128 gallons in. That equals 29.87 mpg

 

well, i have no reason not to believe you. im just jealous

 

Is Lake Powell higher elevation than S.L.C ? Very hard believing that mileage at that speed, even if the true mileage was around 27. Maybe generally going down hill at that speed it may be possible Mileage drops very much at speeds above 65 or so, pushing too much air. If you are getting 27 mpg at 80 then that means you should be getting 32 or 33 at 60 or so and that is hard to buy. Sure you filled the gas tank the same way, or maybe someone put 5 bucks in the tank when you weren't looking
As far as 300 miles on a just over 1/2 tank I just can not see it. I hit 235 once and believe me there was not much driving above 60 to do it.

 

No way it has to be the 6th gear I have autotragic and my best was 25 and that is after I put a K&N filter in, before it read 22

 

A guy here on the forum got 497 out of his 2k 5sp max

Now that is a crazy MPG for a maxima

 

My 1993 SE 5-speed gave 27-28 highway, 23 mixed.
My 2000 SE 5-speed gave 21.5 highway, its best ever in 45K miles.
My 2002 GLE Auto so far appears to be giving me a bit over 300 miles per tank.. haven't done the computations yet, but the mileage so far seems just like my 2000. (I'm still under 1000 miles)

All driving was moderately agressive. Mileage sucks so far, but at least I'm feeding a larger engine (3.5) so that explains some of it.

 

Forgot to mention, on a long highway trip (90miles) trip computer gave me 27.5 mpg. But on the return trip, I only got 24.5 mpg.

I drove the same way in both directions, so I have no idea why there was a difference. At least the temperature gauge seems close.

Should I expect any change in mileage as my 2002 breaks in? I know it isn't as big of a deal these days with microfinished engine parts.

 

If you want to prove out that the trip computer is wrong, just set your cruise control for say 60 MPH, then reset the average speed on the trip computer to zero, and let it compute the average speed again. Mine is out consistently about 5 MPH.

Canadian trip computers read totally different than US trip computers. On the highway, at 100 kilometers an hour (60 MPH), mine reads 7.2 litres per 100 kilometers. The lower the number, the better the mileage. To translate that to US terms it means 31.5 miles per gallon. If i'm going against a headwind, it can be 8.3 liters per 100 kilometers, which is about 27.4 miles per gallon.

For your information, there are 3.78 litres in a US gallon, and there are 60 miles in 100 kilometers.

To confuse you further, there are 4.54 litres in a Canadian gallon. Keep that in mind when you are travelling in Canada and spending your US dollars that are worth $1.60 each in Canada. WHAT A DEAL for you US guys!

 

A really strong tail wind?? Even if the trip computer is off 4 MPG 27 MPG is not shabby at all for a loaded 5th gen.

I got 28 once on the highway but I had a nice Oklahoma tail wind to help... and a couple pre-driving teen passengers I didn't want to influence wrongly (so my driving was sane.)

I just got back from a long trip down I10 to Houston... on my first tank I was at about 290 miles just shy of the 3/4 mark. I thought I was getting great mileage. Then the needle starts to drop like a rock, at fill up I had 24 mpg calculated, I lost a tail wind. I was cruising 85-90.

BuddyWh

 

If wanted an "economy car" I would have bought a sentra

 

I really think, if you aren't getting 25mpg on the highway,you really need to have some kind of adjustment done.But then again maybe your towing a trailer or something your not telling me.

 

Well... I CAN get 25. But it isn't much fun; 23-24 is my average cruising 80-90 and passing with gusto. I'd hazard a guess that a lot of us have this little problem.

Occasional dips to 21 if I had a good isolated section letting me stretch the Max's legs for a few miles. As bad as a lead foot is for mileage at any time in a Max high speed runs can be really bad gas guzzlers.

BuddyWh
BuddyWh

 

I've posted on this topic in the past, and I just can't understand how some people are getting fuel economy that seems much better than mine. I have a 2K2 SE with 6spd and it is a US spec car. I have just over 10k miles on it, but cruising at 80 mph with some local driving mixed in, I am averaging about 18-20mpg. Cruising at about 65, I am getting about 21 mpg (the tach is turning at around 2K rpms). These values are with ONLY me in the car and nothing in tow.

I would really like to know what people are doing to get up around 28 mpg? By the way, my old '95 Honda Civic with a 1.6L v-tec engine and a 5spd manual used to get around 28-32 mpg on the highway. Our 3.5L engines are more than double that size . . . hmmm.

 

Speaking for myself only... staying out of it! Mild accelerating and driving the limit. And a nice push from a steady tail wind.

Also, calculate the mileage, never use the computer's guess of what it is.

And finally, figure your speedo error and adjust your calculated mileage accordingly. Many people with aftermarket wheels and tires are surprised to find out how far off their speedos are.

BuddyWh

 

I will just add I have hit 430 mpg at 80 miles a hour going from Texas to California. That was with 3,000 miles on the car. And it is even better now that I have hit 10,000 miles on my baby.