1st Gen R53 Cooper S Absolute Horrid Fuel Mileage!

This has no bearing on this thread at all, but I seem to have traded "low end torque", for for an extra 145 miles per tank. Thanks for the info.

Jim

 

Hey Jim you'll be the torque of the town. Best stop somewhere & siphon off that excess gas your MINI is making.

Back on topic: I loves my MINI.....

 

OK, so I drove to the coast today and averaged 28.2 mpg and 60.8 mph..... The computer shows I can still go 280 miles and the gas gauge reads just a shade under 3/4. Not too bad for a 150 mile trip. I'll take that.

 

^ I'd be happy with that mileage. It is about what I get with my R53. Mods are JCW intake, JCW exhaust & 15% pulley.....

 

^^ Same mods here except a 16% pulley. Negligible.....

 

There are certain days of the year where I get only 8 MPG on my '06 MCS. :devil:

 

You are not driving hard enough. I've had mine down to 6.7.

 

Guess I just cruise. My most fun mileage was 8.5 MPG. The gas lasted longer than the tires.....

 

I think 200 miles on a tank is a great week.

You do not buy a Mini S (SUPERCHARGED) for fuel milage, Its a drive by smile car.

You should have got a Justa if you wanted good Fuel Mileage. See post #21

 

+1 on that ^^^

 

I bought mine for smiles too. But I also smile at the mileage it gives me. A lot of what I get or don't get is right foot dependent.

 

LOTS of reading on Minis, LOTS of R53 experience, leads me to summarize thusly:

Supercharged engines put out great power per liter - of displacement - but superchargers are NOT as efficient as turbos or normally aspirated motors on fuel economy.

"Normal" on the R53 is beteeen 21-24MPG city, and 25-30MPG highway. There are outliers on either side of that. I get about 23-23.5 mixed (heavily city) driving, and not-quite-29MPG on trips at a consistent 70-75MPH without yo-yoing. Many friends get about the same.

13-14 miles is ju-ust enough to fully warm up the car, so you're traveling a high %age of your drive time at the engine's least efficient state. My commute is, ironically, about 14 miles as well, in the hilly terrain near Pittsburgh, and 23MPG is pretty OK. I still get high 20's on longer drives.

That whistle, by the way, is your boost bypass valve - normal at near 0 boost (very light throttle) conditions as the boost is "bled off"..

Your forged (does nothing for fuel economy) turbo-ed (better than supercharger for fuel economy but essentially fuel-economy-effect-free on the highway), caged (again, minimal-to-zero fuel effect), 300bhp (we know you're bragging - but that motor sounds great!) Miata (lighter, lower, far less wind resistance) is in no way comparable to the supercharged Mini.

Oh - I believe the recommended PSI on the Mini tires is 33, not 38, but mine's not nearby so I can't check.

Not criticizing, hope you enjoy the Mini, as they are certainly GREAT fun. Your Miata may indeed be MORE fun, but perhaps a little less interior space!

 

My MCSc gets 24mpg when I drive her, and 28-29 when my husband the granny does. Commute is 9/10 interstate, 1/10 tons of stoplights city streets. I bought May for the smiles not the miles also.

My previous vehicle was an '03 Harley F-150, so I love having the supercharger again. I knew it would get bad gas mileage-my truck got 13mpg if I was lucky since I was always making her SC whine. I'm very pleased with getting 24mpg-nearly twice as good as I was getting before, and I'm having more fun than I did even in my Shamu truck. Totally worth it.