What gas milage are you getting?

[smlobx]

One thing no one has brought up is the difference you experience when you change your tires as many on here have done. And not bothered to change your speedometer.

Going from the stock Sport tire to the Rubicon tires is a 3.8% difference...meaning that you are actually getting 3.8% better mileage than what your truck is reporting.

It gets even more pronounced if you go from the Sport tire size to 35x12.5 - 17’s. Now the difference in 11.1% better

Sponsored

 

[Happycoop]

Good tonneau cover article...

https://tundraheadquarters.com/the-tonneau-cover-fuel-economy-myth/

Interesting that they say a more "realistic" highway speed is 65mph. I don't know where they drive, but regardless of where I'm at, when I'm on the highway I'm pushing at least 75-80mph all day long just to stay with traffic. Currently live in FL, but we take road trips as far as CO and up to VT pretty routinely. Very few places where speeds drop below 70mph.

 

[Bobzdar]

I'm averaging 19.8 mpg, right at .5mpg less than my virtually identical JLUR got. I usually set cruise to 72mph on the highway.

 

[baylor]

I’ve got around 4,300 miles on my stock Rubicon and was getting around 17mpg (w/ tonneau cover) on relatively flat land.

After installing the Yakima Overhaul HD with CVT tent, driving to and back from North Georgia I was getting between 14-16mpg.

 

[BeepBeepIAmAJeep]

I have to go back and look at that. I thought there was no real difference on Mythbusters with regards to tonneau cover. I thought the only improvement they found was a mesh tailgate (which also begs to question how much the tailgate weighed).

It can be extrapolated from their experiment for driving a truck with the gate up vs down vs off (netted gates). They found having the gate up was significantly more fuel efficient because aerodynamics with the gate up caused the air in the bed to act as like a cushion vice with the gate down the air put down force on the bed which causes larger friction losses at the tire. So having the cover on still gives somewhat of the cushion ability but also removes the drag of the air flowing over the gate (at a cost of some down force on the cover) but I can say from my driving the same route at the same speeds the cover rolled out gave me 1-3 mpg better than the cover rolled up or not installed.

 

[BeepBeepIAmAJeep]

One thing no one has brought up is the difference you experience when you change your tires as many on here have done. And not bothered to change your speedometer.

Going from the stock Sport tire to the Rubicon tires is a 3.8% difference...meaning that you are actually getting 3.8% better mileage than what your truck is reporting.

It gets even more pronounced if you go from the Sport tire size to 35x12.5 - 17’s. Now the difference in 11.1% better

The other piece of that is tire pressure. Granted it has a diminishing effect, I recall doing the calculations in physics back in college that roughly a 1 psi change typically results in a 1.5% fuel efficiency difference. So while the door tag says 37 psi cold, my deal inflated them to 40 psi cold which is almost exactly the % difference in fuel economy I see people posting that dropped their psi down to 37.

 

[JT614]

Good tonneau cover article...

https://tundraheadquarters.com/the-tonneau-cover-fuel-economy-myth/

The actual SEMA study (had to Google it b/c the link within is broken) was a much better read than this. I find it funny he calls it a myth that it saves on gas and then clearly explains that the study proves that it does. Maybe there's a newer study less than 12 years old that shows something different.

 

[ATLalien]

Stock overland with a little over 700 miles. First full tank I used averaged right at 20 mpg. Probably 60% highway driving. Pretty pleased with that for a vehicle of this type.
One thing I've noticed that seems to hurt fuel economy on surface streets is that the transmission seems to hold the 5th - 7th gears for a long time. Anyone else notice that or is it just me?

 

[G8R]

Stock JTR with mud tires. 2113 miles. 90% highway but 800 miles were pulling a trailer. No bed cover. 75 mph most of the time. 16.6 mpg.

 

[BeepBeepIAmAJeep]

Stock overland with a little over 700 miles. First full tank I used averaged right at 20 mpg. Probably 60% highway driving. Pretty pleased with that for a vehicle of this type.
One thing I've noticed that seems to hurt fuel economy on surface streets is that the transmission seems to hold the 5th - 7th gears for a long time. Anyone else notice that or is it just me?

Mine seems to be the opposite, I find it hunting between 6th, 7th, and 8th quite often at speeds between 45 and 75 with varying amounts of head/tail wind and road gradient.

 

[baylor]

Mine seems to be the opposite, I find it hunting between 6th, 7th, and 8th quite often at speeds between 45 and 75 with varying amounts of head/tail wind and road gradient.

This, Mine is the same as yours. I can’t tell if it hurts mpg or not having it constantly changing.

 

[Adawg1203]

Glad to see this thread. I've had my Gladiator LE for exactly one month. I currently have almost 500 miles and my vehicle is stock.

I'm averaging 15MPG with a little bit of highway driving mixed in but not much. In my opinion that seems pretty bad??? I do not have a heavy foot at all. Hopefully this will improve over time but I was expecting much better.

Regardless, i love my Gladiator!!!!

 

[Pion]

I'm in the 15-17 area with my stock LE. I have a stretch of about 12 miles of 80mph highway I commute into town and it kills my mileage.

 

[BeepBeepIAmAJeep]

Glad to see this thread. I've had my Gladiator LE for exactly one month. I currently have almost 500 miles and my vehicle is stock.

I'm averaging 15MPG with a little bit of highway driving mixed in but not much. In my opinion that seems pretty bad??? I do not have a heavy foot at all. Hopefully this will improve over time but I was expecting much better.

Regardless, i love my Gladiator!!!!

What's your tire pressure? What is your typical speed? Do you turn off the @SS system (seriously, these systems in real world applications are a bag of @SS and even the button and dash label it as @)? Do you have a lot of hill changes? When you come to a stop do you idle up to the stop or are you aggressive on the brakes? For freeways do you follow bigger vehicles or drive solo?

Speed is the enemy for MPG especially when driving a 2.5 ton brick. Mythbusters proved a lot of stuff that can help improve your fuel efficiency. At speeds over 55 mph, it's more fuel efficient to use the AC than to have the windows down. Higher tire pressures result in lower friction losses (also less likely to hydroplane in wet environments typically calculated at 10.65 times the square root of your tire pressure). Following big rigs (I like to follow car carrier big rigs because those wont kick up debris because the trailers sit very low and the wheel wells are usually protected so they dont kick stuff up on to the cars they are carrying and damage them) GREATLY improves fuel efficiency (also proven by mythbusters). I personally followed a big rig at 70 mph at 2 bars on the adaptive cruise control and was getting about 32 to 34 mpg over a 30 mile stretch. Carrying as little weight in the vehicle will also slightly improve fuel efficiency. If you are coming up to a red light, letting off the gas and idling down to speed from 300+ yarder back will also significantly improve fuel economy.

These are some basics. Look up "hypermiling" if you want to improve your fuel economy. Some of it makes no sense that it works but it does. One guy was able to get something like 134 mpg in a geo metro incorporating hypermiling if I remember correctly.

 

[BeepBeepIAmAJeep]

Further on the speed issues, the most fuel efficient speed is between 37 and 45 mph for the gladiator. Between that speed it will solo cruise at about 30-38 mpg. At 55, I typically get about 28-32 mpg, 65 is 24-28 mpg, 70 is typically 20-24, and 75+ is typically less than 20 mpg usually in the 18-19 range but I dont drive at these speeds very often so it is hard to give a good number.

Sponsored