Month of February 2024 (Nat’l Avg $3.150)

Mainly driving. I like that. Thanks.Gord.

 

Yeah, I know. With my reduction in economics, & the sky-high price of gasoline(still outrageous in the PNW), I've been experiencing my "pleasure walks", almost universally. But, with my reduced health, I'll experience the Elantra more so. But, I am recovering.

 

As mentioned in the long past, since the wife & I split, the sky-high gas prices & my dropped economics have caused me to drive little. I'm saving every penny, so my next car can be an EV. There are a number of free EV chargers to use here in the region. In multiple places 80-90 miles away, are free chargers that give 40 miles of increased range per hour. With patience(not hard in places I love to be), the chargers would allow me very good mobility. My "pleasure walks" have allowed me to accept my economics & my health has improved.
Then the heart attack hit me. But, 5 days since I've left the hospital, I'm doing very very good. Just checking my I-phone, I "pleasure walked" 1.4 miles total yesterday.

As for my non-Hybrid Elantra, like I said in the past, I only used 3.5 gallons in 7 months of driving, so I haven't even tracked MPG. Right now because I'm not walking the distances yet, I am driving my distances in the local area, only a mile or less at a time. The Elantra shifts to 3rd & then to 4th gear at 25MPH(about 27MPH because of the over-sized tires) out of the 6 gears that I have, so it's only getting 25MPG(?).

 

Today I'm in the Fit. 33 deg F in Naperville , 35
in Elk Grove.

Wind SW 6

33.4 miles, fcd = 47.9 MPG.

 

Busy Saturday. Went for a pack ride (cockapoo in back seat) and wife car shopped EVs with test drives.

65 miles driven, used 79 miles of range so only about 82% efficiency. Sunny day in the upper 30s degF. Used a very nice ChargePoint DC charger on the way home. Paid for 21.3 kWh (SoC 35% to 57% at only 82% efficiency) at a flat 75 kW rate (shared 125 kW CP) so very happy with that. Kicker - $0.15/kWh set by the town utility company. That's half what I pay at home.

For litesong - 75 kW rate is 1C charge rate for the battery... quite harmless.

 

Ha......When(if) I can afford an EV, there are a number of FREE EV chargers in my region. The problem is they generally are only 5kw to 9kWs. So to get any appreciable amount of range from the chargers will entail hours of waiting. Then, I thought, if those chargers are near areas I like to be, then I could spend hours in those areas, while the EV car is nearby charging. Delightfully, I've found FREE chargers in areas for me to explore & enjoy.
One charger I could use a lot tho, is in an area next to a busy 4 lane highway, that I've previously searched with seemingly little of interest. Then, I noticed a dead-end road, that if I bush whack cross country, one hundred yards through brush to a railroad track, I can eventually make my way to a wildlife park that I love. I think my heart will be OK. ALSO, on the satellite map, I found a nearby University of Washington experimental forest providing a nice 1 mile "pleasure walk" through the Wood!

So now, at a place I thought was going to be boring, I've found multiple interesting things to do!!! Cool!

 

Glad you found a place you can enjoy, litesong. But do be careful with the bushwhacking. It would be good to let someone know where you're going to be, lest you be lost for who knows how long.

 

Thanks for the safety tip. In the past, I used my machete to get things done. Them days are decades in the past, & the machete long retired. If I am at the end of that dead-end & can't see an easy way to the railroad tracks, I'll try another way, keeping me close to civilization. Hey, this is Washington state. It's supposed to have uncivilized places. & it still does to the state's betterment.

PS....From the apt., I just saw a Bald Eagle pass over the apt. complex. I first hoped it might have been an Osprey returning to the nest in the nearby tower. I don't know when the Ospreys will show up. We'll see.

PS I....Just looked up when Osprey return to WA state. They say they'll return late March-early April. I was hoping sooner. Hey, its Global Warming. Maybe they'll show up sooner.

PS II....When I got out of the hospital, the doctors perscribed 6 medications for my heart. Man, I'm happy that my health insurance is very good, the meds costing me only $10. Some people with poor or no insurance at all, would have been soaked!

 

Today I drove the Fit. 30 deg F in Naperville, 31 in
Elk Grove.

Wind S 3

33.4 miles, fcd =47.2 MPG.

I can only put one car in my garage at this time , and the Elantra
lives there. That means I need to scrape frost of the Fit every
morning that I drive it to work. Thursday I will drive the Elantra;
Saturday and Sunday , too.

 

30-31F is a heatwave in Illinois.
One time zone to the east, it was 31F-34F but still a scrape & brush morning. Landed at the office at 52.5 FCD over 18.2 miles. If I cranked up the defroster instead of scraping the frost from the glass, it would have been total carnage on the FCD. Plastic scraper for the win.
And I remember to remove the frost from the Triangle Of Doom - the little three-sided porthole in the rearview mirror mount where the safety-camera lives. If that is frosted over, you get cyber-hysteria messages ("Camera blocked - Safety features disabled") from the little electronic karen that wants to talk to your manager every time you get too close to the lane markers.

 

Heck , I don't even start the engine until windows
have been cleaned and seat belt engaged.

And almost all of my safety features in my Hyundai were turned off
by my salesman Eddie before I wrote the check.

 

39degF.....Tho I'm at a PNW higher latitude than Edwin & MaxxMPG, I'm a bit warmer, due to the Pacific Ocean & Northwest heading westerlies. Homeless people must feel a bit relieved due to a bit less cold this PNW Winter. No ice on my Elantra. Its nice that the apts. around me, heat me & my own apt. heat is off, except for my 700Watt spot heater(now off). Just need an extra sweatshirt to be comfortable. Supposed to be part clouds, but thin fog is the condition now. Partly cloudy in Western Washington here, really means nearly all clouds. Predicted to get as high as 48degF today. Will "pleasure walk" to the Senior Center & library.

PS, 12:15PM.....Just back from a "pleasure walk", waiting for the visiting nurse to get here. Day turned out very nice, with temp at 50degF now. Over the decades, February is increasingly having comfortable days.

 

Today I'm in the Elantra.
I didn't check the distance , but it's
probably around 32.0 miles. Because I don't
have an I-Pass (yet) I don't take the tollway.
Scenic route #2 is shorter and possibly more efficient.
FCD = 66.9 MPG

 

In my Elantra, I've often listened to Rachmaninoff's Symphony #2 on my Scenic route #2. If you drive slower on your Scenic route #2, you'll hear the entire Rachmaninoff Symphony #2(depending on whether it's the more "efficient or more beautiful version"). Probably the Symphony #2 isn't as efficient as you, but it'll be more beautiful & will fit better on your Scenic route #2.

Temperature at 38degF. The day may not be as warm & nice as yesterday's lovely day. But, rain looks like it'll hold off till tomorrow.

 

You have Trip A and Trip B screens in the trip computer display next to the speedometer. I never reset Trip A in my car and it is therefore total mileage and LMPG. Trip B will reset after the car is parked about four hours, so it becomes a trip average. You get the distance up top, labeled Trip. Then you get trip MPG, then at the bottom, time since the car booted up. The distance is likely a little low since the odometer is a little underclocked.
What's interesting is that the time is only when the car is "on", so if you run a series of errands, the clock pauses while it's parked and then resumes when you're going again. It's an easy way to see "seat time during the trip", as you will see when you drive to Michigan. The time on the dash will be less than the start/end times you note if you stop for breaks.

 

I have the Blue trim. I think you have the Limited.
They don't call it Trip A and Trip B in my car.
It's a bit confusing. I'm still on the first tank, a little more than half full.
I like to reset one tripmeter for eah trip , and the other one for each tank.
I don't worry about overall.

I'll figure it out soon. Also , I don't think my car will display tire pressure.

I will go back and read your last post more carefully.

 

Yes I have the Limited. The contents of the LCD in the cluster are about the same for each model. I think these cars call the two trip counters "Drive Info" and "Accumulated Info" - with distance, mpg and time in hh:mm.
I checked the owners manual (modest 7mb PDF) and it shows the LCD has five modes - "Trip Computer", "Turn by Turn", "Driving Assist", "User Settings", and "Warning". The TPMS screen is under that Warning grouping. Press the menu button to cycle through the available menu groups to get to that last one then the use the up/down arrows to scroll to look for pressure.

You may find the DTE can sometimes go up, as happened to me last night. I left the office with 68 miles DTE and then went full-CleanMPG on driving techniques on the trip since the fuel gauge was a click under 1/8. It slowly dropped to 60 and then hung there for about 4 miles, then went up to 61 as I got to creep along a little in traffic. Arriving home, it showed 72.2 FCD and 61 miles to empty. It dropped 7 miles DTE on an 18 mile trip.
On bootup this morning, it showed 60 and then dropped to 58 as i got to the Shell station 3 miles away. With the gauge showing a tiny bit under 1/8, it took all of 9.3 gallons to fill it. Then it was off like a turtle on nyquil to head out to the office.

 

Got some bad wretched news from my separated wife. She's physically OK. The news isn't totally unexpected, but sooner than I thought the news would come. Sometimes the World jumps on you.