Ok, so yesterday I did a horribly long trip that I have to do periodically for vacation. This trip was from Springfield, MO to Colorado Springs, CO. Approximately 750ish miles all done on the Dart in my signature.
A couple things I noticed:
1. At around 75 the car gets a little shaky. Not too horrible, but noticeable.
2. At 75 you can still achieve the 39 mpg through Kansas with cruise set. For a very, very long time. (I hate Kansas.)
3. Tire pressure sensors. I'm not a huge fan of them at the moment. When I first bought the car (off the lot, not ordered and delivered) I noticed the passenger side front tire was a little low. It got down to around 30-31 PSI after 30 miles (mileage from dealer to my house to dealer). I asked them to check it out, as well as replace a few of the caps on the valve stems because some of them were split. The service guy looked at it, said all tires were good, and the sensor just needed to be "broken in". I should have called BS card there because the morning I left Springfield I noticed that my TPMS light was on and the air pressure in the tire was at 27psi. Checked the tire and the tire was still sitting at 34. So, no loss in pressure, just annoying light. Once I got about 3/4 of the way done with the trip I noticed the light went off and the TPMS was reading 33 for that tire. Not a huge deal breaker, but amazingly annoying.
Lastly, was the mileage. I first drove to Springfield in my 99 Ram costing me in the area of $250. I made a spreadsheet (I'm a nerd) and found that with the Dart it cost me $100. And I still have a full tank from my last fill up which was 70 miles away. My overall average MPG was 35.4 and the most I got per tank was 341 (left remaining was sitting at 250 miles, but I wasn't going to risk it being the car was at a quarter of a tank).
I don't know if this will help anyone, but I figured I'd put up my personal specs for a decently long trip so people can see what kind of to expect if they do the same.
Our 2.0 isn't broken in yet (206 miles so far) but we are averaging 28-29 city mpg.
Only trip we have taken was on the highway back from the dealer (car was delivered to the dealership about 20 miles away) and at 65-70 were were averaging 33-34.
After the engine gets broken in and loosens up a bit the mileage should get better.
Will be doing the initial 1000 mile oil change, then every 6000.
i have the 14T sxt as well. im averaging 22-23mpg mostly around town (25-35mph). i do a little highway driving and i goose it every now and then. was this about the same for you? ive got under 400 miles on it so its still not broken in. good to see the numbers on the long trip looking promising!
I have just hit 2000 miles on my dart. I have the 1.4T with the 6 speed manual and so far I am averaging about 31mpg combined. I am only on the freeway about 7 miles each way to work so most of my driving is around town. A couple of weeks back we took a road trip from Portland, Or up to Seattle, Wa for the day. I had 4 people in the car and with the cruise set at 70 mph most of the way we averaged 38.1 mpg. I think it could have been higher with only 1 or 2 people in the car but I am very pleased with that number.
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