Hello! New hybrid owner, glad to join the forum.

I live in Portland, Oregon and since I bought my 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid in May 2008 I've never got below 40 MPG. Now that I have put on 10k miles and the weather is colder, I'm lucky to get over 39 MPG.

I assume that is the auto-stop feature not working as much, but maybe I am missing something. I'm wondering if other owners have faced this problem and what their solutions have been. Thanks!

-John

 

Same car.... same problem!

If you check through the various threads you will find this is completely normal.

A very popular approach is cover the lower grille opening with foam pipe insulation for 3/4" pipe. It's inexpensive and easy to cut to fit. In colder climates a block heater is very helpful too.

Allow the engine to warm up before using the heater and try to minimize heavy electric loads like the rear defroster. Living in Portland gives you a real advantage over many other areas, but still, the cool weather will affect your mileage.

Another suggestion is to consider your driving routine to avoid shorter trips when the engine is cold. For example, if you have several errands, do to the furthest one first and then work your way back home.

Welcome to GreenHybrid. You'll find a vast source of information shared here.

Cheers,

Roger

 

Welcome John and welcome to driving your HCH II in winter...

I wear thermals, scarf and coat, gloves and use no heat. I take hot tea with me too. The grill is 50% covered in temps above freezing, 100% when they're below. My commute is only 13 miles, so I don't mind the cold.

What I found really important though is to maintain your state of charge ( SoC ) whenever you can. The car is very Assist happy in the cold mornings, but there is no regeneration to throw the energy back. So it keeps assisting and assisting and draining the battery. This could cause a forced recharge and knock your mileage even more. I try to be sure that by the time a pull into the driveway from my afternoon commute, my battery is 7-8 bars for the morning. It's truly not an easy feat.

Try also to just the car down during long lights until the auto stop kicks in and let the high throttle of the engine pull you, especially down hills.

Enjoy the ride and good luck...

Jess

 

Yeah I have been getting less than optimal mileage during the winter as well. Just got my 09 and my first tank was about 36mpg and I'm at about 37 on my second. I'm guessing the cold is hurting my mileage, or at least I hope so

 

Last week I noticed this piece on the Civic hybird

http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17560

 

So, msantos lives. He used to be a major contributor here and left mysteriously. Glad to see he is still a hypermiler. I was afraid he'd gone to the dark side and got a Hummer.

nf

 

Indeed... I kind of had the impression that maybe he was letting slip some engineering secrets Honda didn't want widely known

 

Hi John,

I live in the Portland area too, and while mileage has dropped a little, it's not been a lot. In fact my last fill yielded exactly 50mpg. Are you taking lots of short trips? Most of ours are 30-60 mins, plenty of time to warm up and offset the initial drain. Also, I go against the people that'll tell you not to use the cabin heater / ac as I think it more important that the car feel in control of heating and cooling it's battery - so I leave it on auto all the time. I use the voice command "Climate Control Full Automatic", which somehow is different than without the word full...maybe. Not really sure, but why would they be separate commands if not?

Also, if you haven't read Tarbell's article, you should def check it out.

 

I actually get better mileage in winter by not running AC--but then we don't have much of a winter down here!