When I brought my '06 dbw home on the 3 hour drive from the guy I bought it from, it was all highway, top up. Even cruising at 75, I got just shy of 30 mpg. Pleased.

But then I find I only get 24 mpg on my daily all highway (always top down) commute. Less than pleased.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, top down vs up makes a significant difference.

 

sorry to thread jack, but how do you like the s2000 overall compared to the e46 m3? just curious because i currently own an e46 m3 and will hopefully soon have an s2000 as well. btw, i get an average of 25mpg on the highway with my m3. almost the same with an s2k i guess. hmmm

 

I was actually wondering about that, I drive literally everywhere with the top down and see around 23-24mpgs, +1 for San Diego, unfortunately I've been getting a little sun burnt haha.

 

the s2k is less areodynamic with the top down. more drag = more fuel consumption. albeit i don't believe it will make a significant difference

 

Based on the topic title, I thought it took him 10 years to use a tank of gas.

 

^ That's what I thought at first.

I've gotten nearly 340 miles from one tank during road trip with no traffic.

 

I have owned a bunch of honda/acura products and only one other BMW (an E46 325xi). While I loved my M, it simply guzzled too much even with a light foot and repair/maintenance costs are outrageous. My local dealer charged over $200 for an oil change. I did the brakes/pads by myself and it still cost me close to $700 not even using non-OEM parts (got the Stoptech brake parts from Turner Motorsports). Plus the services are pricey for regular required stuff and I had close to 90k miles on it. Just not worth it to keep it anymore.

We have a Pilot for lugging around the family, so wife and I decided to get a fun car for us and my use to get to work. Hence the S2k. My friend has owned 2 and back in '02 or so I installed a Vortech SC kit on one that a guy from my old office bought. So I knew and liked the S2K a lot and have been looking forward to owning one for a bit.

 

I've averaged 19.22mpg over 4,000 miles of driving, with the worst being 15.65mpg and the best 28.14mpg. Most of my miles are a hilly city commute driven pretty gingerly, shifting before 4k, with some occasional hooning on the weekends and one long road trip that produced the 28mpg tank. The car is only rated for 18 city, 24 highway but most owners report better MPG. Could there be something wrong with my car? Tires fully inflated, new engine air filter, fresh oil change, new spark plugs, professionally cleaned injectors, driving with top down about half the time, A/C almost always on.

 

Your car is just like mine. I regularly get 18-20mpg in flat local/city driving, and I drive it pretty aggressively. I can get 24-27 on the highway. I've seen 30 on a leisure drive down the blue Ridge Parkway. I'm convinced that being able to coast on downhills is more efficient overall than flat roads.

 

You should get better gas mileage. I don't think I've gotten worse than 23mpg in my car the entire time I've owned. And there's plenty of WOT pulls made in the car. Hell, even my 97 Prelude with the H22 would routinely get 24mpg no matter how I drove it. And that doesn't include a lot of highway miles at all.