Fuel consumption..?.. 13.3 - 17.5 MPG

[M. Schneider]

What are others experiencing for fuel consumption with the OB XT? Our XT just hit the 1k mileage piont and seems to guzzling fuel. Granted I'm pushing the car up and down the interstate at 75 -100mph here in the mountains of Colorado; this car is thirsty!

Is this the MPG range for the XT motor?

Cheers,
MS

[Subietonic]

What are others experiencing for fuel consumption with the OB XT? Our XT just hit the 1k mileage piont and seems to guzzling fuel. Granted I'm pushing the car up and down the interstate at 75 -100mph here in the mountains of Colorado; this car is thirsty!

Is this the MPG range for the XT motor?

Cheers,
MS

Several here on the board are recording better mpg than what you are getting but I think the defining difference is "pushing the car...at 75-100mph...in the mountains" which will use a lot of fuel on almost any vehicle. I know, it's hard to keep that power in check, LoL.

Your fuel consumption will continue to improve as the engine loosens up and you'll continue to see increased butt dyno power too.

Try lowering your speeds for a tank or two and see what kind of mileage it returns.

SBT

[Belgarath]

I'm in Colorado too... and I'm getting 19mpg in the city and about 25mpg for the one highway stint we took it on. Currently at 1800 miles.

[*Jedimaster*]

OBXT LTD here and I get in the 17-18 mpg range. Of course, I'm not doing 75-100 in the mountains :lol:

[docsmile71]

I get about 18-19mpg. I have 4500 miles on my XT. Mixed city and highway driving. I did do a few straight highway runs at about 80mph. Averaged about 20mpg.

It's a heavy car with full time awd. Plus mine is an auto so that also kills mileage.

[Plaz]

I've got 2500 miles on my 5-speed and have been averaging about 20mpg in the burbs. Got upwards of 26 on the highway. I bet I'd get 14-15 mpg if I were pushing up the mountains at over 75 mph. I don't think that's too bad for this class of car.

[kanoswrx]

I get about 15-18, usually driving in city type traffic with lots of stop and go, plus I have times when I like to push it for fun. Its about what my WRX got so its normal I guess. I think if I did all highway it would easily get above 20 miles per gallon, maybe around 25.

[fan42025]

Not sure why but I get much better figures - perhaps because of the 2.0L and 98RON fuel. I typically get 12.5 km/l or 30mpg on long freeway trips. City driving varies between 17-20mpg depending on the weight of my lead foot.

[sduford]

I have an OBXT 5MT with 3000 miles and my mileage is still improving. I average about 22Mpg in combined rural roads/city driving.

I just did a trip from Ottawa to Montreal and back yesterday (about 5 hours total). I drove over on a 4-lane highway at 75Mph (cruise) with a light tail wind, drove back on a two-lane highway at about 60Mph (with some headwind, low speed villages and some high speed passing). I averaged 24.5 Mpg, this with winter tires on and temperatures below freezing.

I'm beginning to feel better about the fuel consumption of this car!

I did a couple of short stint at 85-90 Mph which brings the car well into turbo boost and the consumption does increase significantly when you do that.

[gtguy]

Your right foot is a very effective fuel economy device. Stay off boost, and fuel consumption will be fine. Boost=lots of fuel=low gas mileage.

Kevin

[docsmile71]

I'm actually thinking of getting a boost controller so that when I'm cruising on the highway, I'll shut off the boost. This should help to get the mileage into the mid 20's. You guys think this will work?

[anotherbrian]

Last tank of gas was good for 21.5mpg (~340 miles), _non-stop_ interstate at avg 80mph, with lots of rain and a bit of a tailwind. I think the computer was showing ~25mpg at 65mph, but I wasn't as worried about mpg as time.

Was fun to watch the instantaneous MPG decrease, increase, and then decrease again before returning to 21.5mpg while passing big rigs. Back when I rode a motorcycle I noticed that if I got close enough to one I'd get sucked along and could let up on the throttle, and I think the Subaru's fuel computer was showing that.

Around town driving I've been getting ~18mpg.

[docsmile71]

anotherbrian,

How's the S2K mileage? I'm looking to get a daily driver and was thinking of the S2K. Is it a good commuter car? I currently drive a 2000 Sentra SE which gets about 27-28mpg at a steady 90mph. I want something a little faster. Thanks.

[red beast]

15 mpg city

27 highway going 65 on cruise control

[anotherbrian]

anotherbrian,

How's the S2K mileage? I'm looking to get a daily driver and was thinking of the S2K. Is it a good commuter car? I currently drive a 2000 Sentra SE which gets about 27-28mpg at a steady 90mph. I want something a little faster. Thanks.
10mpg track, 18mpg city, 24mpg highway.

If you live in a warm weather climate, it might make a passable daily driver. The stock tires don't do well in the cold, and (if not brand new) are terrible in the rain -- you can always replace them with something more practical, but a lot of the cars joy comes from the OEM tires. If you can put up with the noise, rough ride, and the thieves (the seats are desirable) it'd make a fun car to drive every day -- personally, ours is in the garage except on warm weekends.

[c_hunter]

I get 19-21 in mixed driving (commute 70 miles a day at 65-80mph) and 23-24 on long highway trips. I tend to enjoy the engine a lot, which isn't helping things....

CRaig

[FAST4DR]

Fuel mileage and trip distance on the 2.5 XT suck. Our outback has 1400 miles on it and on the last trip we only got 20.3 mpg on a tank of gas that was 95% highway driving. Ouch. Car only has a 16.9 gallon tank. So if we use 15 gallons, that leaves a cruising distance of 300 miles=sucks!. In contrast, our 3.5 Altima(240 hp) gets 28-29 mpg on the highway consistently, and has a 20 gallon tank, we regularly get about 460-480 miles before needing to fill up. Those extra miles are nice on long trips. I also have two taurus SHO's(220+hp V6) that can go 450 miles on a tank of gas. What's up with Subaru? Our last legacy was the same way. I love the car, but little things just don't make sense.

Will

[Beanboy]

Getting 24-26mpg at highway (70-80) speeds. Getting about 350-380 miles a tank before refueling. Around town, about 17-19 so far.

-B

[sduford]

I agree the tank is too small for this car, 350 mile range is OK, but not great.

OMG! I just broke my own rules :)

[fan42025]

OK, today I beat my previous figures. On a 50km freeway trip travelling around 110kph most of the time, mostly flat with some hills, hardly no traffic, I got 16km/l or 38mpg (using US gallons - imperial gallons works out at 45mpg). And this was with the aircon on being a hot day.

[sduford]

Must have had a big tail wind!

[Tooshea]

I drive 95miles a day I get 21.5mpg. I do wish they had a bigger tank.

[jsafe]

It seams like mine got better after 5k miles, so there is something you brand-new-bees can look forword to..

[Nawambo]

I do relatively heavy in city driving and average about 17/18, on the hwy, I get around 26. I'm satisfied, especially when I compared the mileage to my father's FX35.

[Legacy05]

I've been keeping a detailed track of the MPG in my car .... I have so far filled up my car 7 times ..

20.82 19.51 21.13 19.83 21.63 20.78 23.40

for an avg of 21.02 .. not too shabby, I did allot of highway driving on my last tank.

[M3Man]

The day after we got our XT-MT in December, we took a 700 mile trip, mostly at 70 to 80mph. we did some in 4th gear and some in 5th to vary the rpms during break-in. MPG was about 19. Car now has 2600 miles on it, including the 700 mile return trip, 300 miles at 7000 feet in the snow, the rest city driving in Dallas-part freeway, part stop light derby. We never reset the MPG meter, and our average for the 2600 miles is 23.

Lets face it-fast cars use fuel to go fast. This is a near exact match for my M3, and our 190 hp Maxima. Few 3400 lb cars as fast as the GT/XT do much better. We're hauling a lot of weight, and losing some efficiency churning the drive train for all 4 wheels.

[DAVES XTOUTBK]

I started out getting 18-19mpg city driving at first but now with 3500 miles it's dropped down to 15.5mpg. Any idea why it would get worse mileage as time goes on?

dave

[boris]

Probably b/c it's the middle of the winter and you live in Rochester, NY. All those very cold starts and occasionally letting it sit to warm up. My OBXT is getting about 15.5 MPG in Chicago right now. Down 2-3 MPG from the warmer weather. I've gotten worse winter mileage in every car I have ever owned...

[Beanboy]

Down to 13.1, a new low! Way too much fun in the snow. Curious if I can hit single digit average when I go ice racing in February... wish me luck! :D

[dustdr]

Just broke the 1,000 mile barier with my new xt ltd. All but 250 miles have been city driving and getting 18 MPG. Happy to now be able to put my foot into it more after keeping engine below 4000 rpm for the first 1,000 miles. Maybe you are driving too fast to get decent milage?:cool:

[Subietonic]

Just broke the 1K mile barrier today too and have been keeping detailed records:

First four tanks: Dealer's fill unknown provider, remainder Shell V-Power Premium Unleaded

Tank 1 (Dealer delivery - presume 91 octane), 21.13 MPG, 50/50 highway/city
Tank 2 (91 Octane), 18.03 MPG, predominantly city
Tank 3 (91 Octane), 18.48 MPG, predominantly city, some highway
Tank 4 (91 Octane), 21.19 MPG, some city, some highway, remainder mountain.

Overall 19.71 MPG mixed driving and trending upwards slightly

Interesting observation - once I crossed the 1000 mile threshold, the power delivery seemed to change. I still don't rev into the upper rpm registers, but power seems to come on sooner and more pronounced than it did before the 1000 mile point. Not sure if this is the ECU releasing more power as a function of reaching it's intended 1000 mile learning curve or what. Just thought I'd throw that into the mix.

FWIW - real change in gas mileage on my other Subarus happened about 50,000 miles with a change upward as the engines finally loosened up.

SBT

[dustdr]

Good to know. If I MPG was first priority for me, I would have not purchased the 250HP Turbo. Better economy could have been had with the lesser engine, but then I would have lost all the SPG's (smiles per gallon). Let's face it, got to pay to play...

I am curious to see if the EUC does its thing. My first sube and compared to the '97 Ford Exploder I dumped with 180,000 miles, I am loving the high perfomance burning less fuel.

DustDr

[dimil]

Down to 13.1, a new low! Way too much fun in the snow. Curious if I can hit single digit average when I go ice racing in February... wish me luck! :D

12.6 is average from 137miles as reads on trip computer (real thing must be even lower).
Down to less than 1/4 of tank from full in this 137 miles.
:D That did include some fun in the snow :D

[Lodro]

My Saab Viggen gets 25-26 mpg dirving up and down very steep mountain interstate at 80+ mph, inclusing busrts of passing speed. The Vig is often in a low boost, but to offset that the revs are pretty low. I sure hope my ne OB XT doesn't do as poorly as you indicate at the same speeds. :( I would expect somewaht worse because of awd and +weight but not that much...

[Subietonic]

I'm up to 20.5 combined city/highway - mostly city.

SBT

[Legacy05]

I am up to 21.66 .. I have been keep tracking of all my fillups and such. of course, I had one trip back from skiing and avg'd 26.44 MPG .. so that skewed things up a bit :)

[Lodro]

OK, I only have 110 miles but I just got 20.1 mpg up and down Parleys canyon (twisty constant 1-3% grades) at 80mph, including a bit of city. Not bad really at all.

[03Indigo]

Colorado Metro Denver driving, from Westminster to C-470 and Santa Fe, 50 mile round trip, about 600 miles on the car, and other in town driving...highway speeds around 70-75mph....and I am averaging 23.7mpg on this second tank, and overall, 21.3mpg, I have not reset the odo on program B so I can see what the long term average is.

[Car Dude]

I've only had my OB XT Lmtd (Auto) for 2 days now and it has about 150 miles on the odo. This is probably 80% interstate between 55-80mph and 20% city on winter gas with the temp at or below freezing. This is on a dealer filled tank so I am assuming 91-92 octane. Best we can get around here is 93 and even that is hard to find.

I have been using the Sportshift to vary the RPMs to help during break-in. I have also been using the Sportshift to Engine brake from 4,000rpm to 1500rpm through about 3 gears, which also won't help mileage, but have read it is good for proper break-in. The trip computer is only showing 12.9MPG avg. This is worrisome to me but only in the slightest sense. I know the trip comupters aren't accurate but they tend to be on the optimistic side, not pessimistic. :lol:

I know the engine is no where near being broken in at all and not even close to being broken in for good gas mileage. Have owned 5 different Subaru in the past.

Car Dude

[03Indigo]

don't worry about the trip, remember that when the car is first run, it just goes from parking lot to parking lot, lots of idle time, so that is in the calculation. If you reset the trip, you will reset the milage calcualtion, and you will see your milage be much better. I left mine on program B, never reset it, and when I drove off the lot, 68 miles on the clock, my program B MPG was only 9.3. Now at close to 600, it is reading somewhere over 21 MPG...did not look at it this morning, but you get the idea. I only have reset the Program A.....

[dustdr]

2400 miles on odometer now and averaging 21.5 mpg with combination of city, hwy, and mountain miles...

[DrMerl]

I'm actually thinking of getting a boost controller so that when I'm cruising on the highway, I'll shut off the boost. This should help to get the mileage into the mid 20's. You guys think this will work?

You normally cannot "shut off" boost, you can turn it down to what the wastegate is set for, used to be 10psi in my WRX. Not sure bout the 2.5.

[M. Schneider]

Our OB XT w/AT is now at the 3k mileage marker with the MPG figures only improving slightly,
with a city/Hwy. use, its in the 16.5 - 18 range. O'Kay.. the XT will not be winning any awards for MPG's but where does the Monroney Lable get off stateing 19city-25Hwy.?

Down which mountain will this car ever come close to 25MPG?? On a related note, Is there any chance Subaru would enhance the fuel tank capacity given the real world mileage figures? Just a thought, as the time between fill ups is sooner than ya think; every 240 miles in our case.
My .02

[*Jedimaster*]

If I'm easy on the car, I get 90 miles to the first quarter of a tank, then it's at the halfway mark by 150. By this time, the trip computer is telling me I have 170 miles unti empty, but then every few miles it drops faster and faster- down to 160, 150, etc.

I'd say 240 on a tank is about right. My week is mostly mixed highway and city, with more city than highway. Actually, I never see 55 because I use backroads- rural routes that are supposed to be 35 but I do 45 or 50.

[Deer Killer]

Actually, I never see 55 because I use backroads- rural routes that are supposed to be 35 but I do 45 or 50.best mpg seems to be ~45ish in 5th gear with cruise control.. for a gt atleast.

[dustdr]

I don't get it. 6000 miles now and pulling 20.4 as average. 30% city, the rest Hwy. Hwy miles at 80-90 mph. I do redline it a lot in town, and on the open 2-lanes do the same when passing. Guess I must be awful lucky. Road trip next week of about 2100 miles. Will keep extreme watch at the pump and see if all is the same....

[gt_ltd]

just came back from a 37-mile hwy drive, averaged 23.7MPG. did my 7500 miles oil change yesterday and everything seems to be smoother now.

[M. Schneider]

I'll eat the words I've just said.... 22.6 MPG recently! Had the ECU cleared the other day so as to start freash with the learning aspect and my poor MPG stats. We'll I'll be dipped in shite if the car didn't clear 310 miles before the refuel indicator signaled and 340 miles before stopping for fuel. This was a 340 mi. cycle of mostly hwy driving though 220 mi. of it was a round trip to Vail (mtns.) at speeds of 70-85mph. Decent!!!

We Happy !

Cheers,
Mike

[stewthebassman]

Who cleared the ECU, the dealer? That sounds very cool.

[M. Schneider]

Yes. A Subaru dealer cleared the ECU as asked, while programing a new Key and remote.

As an aside, 1 hour <$83.00> tech time to program for a new key & remote ??? What a rip-off at the John Elway Subaru dealership in S.E. Denver! .... You've been warned.

Cheers,
MS

[stewthebassman]

Whose idea was it to reflash? It seems like a brilliant (sic) idea. And to hear that your performance stats are now YOUR stats and not the delivery stats (etc), it seems like everyone should have this done! For free of course.

[M. Schneider]

The ECU clearing idea came after several poor MPG stats (full to empty cycles) in light of radically changing my driving style. The dealership service writer who instructed a tech to perform the ECU clearing, didn't have a clue unfortunatley.

We'll see as I'm now 50% through a second tank. The favorable MPG stats are looking to repeat. I'll let ya know.....

Cheers,
MS

[NasdTrader]

It was my understanding that disconnecting the negative terminal on the battery for about 20 minutes will clear the ECU - though, I'm slightly skeptical of this on the legacy because I had the batt. disconnected for quite a while during a mod, and my odomiter trip distances were still accurate.

Regarding MPG, I have 1300 miles and it has been steadily improving. First tank of gas saw 18mpg, my current tank is over 3/4 done and i'm getting 20-21, half highway at 75mph, half city with a few redlines.

[dustdr]

Just completed 1800 mile road trip. 22.3 MPG Average for the trip crusing on hiway at 83 MPH. Over all since start, now 8000 miles is 20.4

[Nawambo]

I'm in DC, I average anywhere between 17 and 21 in the city, and about 26 on the highway.

[Lodro]

I just made my first longish roadtrip w/>2k on the car. 25.5 at 75-85 mostly flat but some mountain driving. Now getting 21.5 avg. mostly (fast and mountainous) hwy driving. Mileage has definetly improved now that the car is broken in.