Today is ECO day. And the first ECO test was (what I was hoping to be) my 65mph run into work. Well that only lasted for about 20 miles (damn inconsiderate people...clogging up the freeways and ruining my data collection!), but it was enough to get the feeling I could do just about as well without ECO.
My 20 miles had cost me 3 bars of energy and I was getting average energy economy of only 4.1mpkWh. To all intents and purposes I can pretty well get 4mpkWh at those speeds without using ECO. By the time I'd completed the trip in stop-and-go, the energy economy had increased to 4.3mpkWh, but I think I could have just as easily gotten to that in D too.
Here are the hard numbers.....
Starting range @ 100% charged - 90 D miles (as opposed to ECO, just to avoid confusion)
Finishing range after 30.5 miles driven - 58 D miles
Finishing SOC 67% (which we now know could be anywhere from 54-67%)
The only number that appears to be an improvement is the finishing range. You'll remember that on the other days I got here with between 40 and 45 miles used. This time I appeared to use only 32. But that could be anything from the last 10 miles at slower speeds to a statistical anomaly caused by the appearance of having fewer miles when starting out. Who the heck knows. I'm more inclined to believe the number of energy bars I consume over the range figure at this point.
Gut feeling....ECO is a waste of time at freeway speeds, and it makes the car feel like a slug. So no thanks.
My 20 miles had cost me 3 bars of energy and I was getting average energy economy of only 4.1mpkWh. To all intents and purposes I can pretty well get 4mpkWh at those speeds without using ECO. By the time I'd completed the trip in stop-and-go, the energy economy had increased to 4.3mpkWh, but I think I could have just as easily gotten to that in D too.
Here are the hard numbers.....
Starting range @ 100% charged - 90 D miles (as opposed to ECO, just to avoid confusion)
Finishing range after 30.5 miles driven - 58 D miles
Finishing SOC 67% (which we now know could be anywhere from 54-67%)
The only number that appears to be an improvement is the finishing range. You'll remember that on the other days I got here with between 40 and 45 miles used. This time I appeared to use only 32. But that could be anything from the last 10 miles at slower speeds to a statistical anomaly caused by the appearance of having fewer miles when starting out. Who the heck knows. I'm more inclined to believe the number of energy bars I consume over the range figure at this point.
Gut feeling....ECO is a waste of time at freeway speeds, and it makes the car feel like a slug. So no thanks.