HipHotRod

I dig this little car!....I tried the search tool again and its way to cumbersome so please bear with me here.

#1. At what interval have you guys and gals did the first oil change?

#2. Gas mileage. Mine sucks!....granted I drive about 10 miles a day all short distances. Its a 2.4 auto. Ive been doing the "whip" break in routine. Im getting about 190 miles from a tank of gas. This doesnt seem right. Any thoughts.

#3 Installed the rear sway bar, MAN does that make a difference!


Thanks!

Donnie

ivtech

1. Oil change your choice follow the DIC oil life or 3000 to 35000 miles there are different school of thought
2. What is your average speed. The more street and less highway the lower the mpg. Yours does seem low.

an08HHR

It is hard to break away from the old school of thought about changing oil every 3000 but I will begin to wait for the DIC to tell me. I only have 135 miles on my new HHR but my wife has a 08 Jeep Compass and a little over 5600, it had a pop up "change oil soon" or something like that displayed on the inst cluster.
Fill your tank with gas, write down your mileage. Now the next time you get gas, write down the mileage again and subtract the two and divide that by the gallons of gas you put in on the second filling to get your actual mpg. (you can also reset the trip odo on the first fill up and that will tell how many miles you drove when you fill it the 2nd time) You should be getting around 22 mpg at a min. mpg. If it is only in the teens, I would go to the dealer and have them check if it can be tuned for better mileage. Take some lead out of your right foot for awhile also and see if you get better mileage.

SandyBeach

I do mine every 4,000 miles instead of 3. You have to rotate the tires so you might as well make the oil changes at the same time. I rotate every other oil change.

Old Lar

190 miles/tank of gas! Something is wrong with the way you drive or something is wrong with the car. The worst milage I have seen with my 2.4L auto is 25 mpg, which would work out to be 375 miles/tank. I usually get >30 mpg in mixed driving.

My last oil change was after 8000 miles with the DIC saying 39% life expectancy left. I use Mobil 1 5-30 and did it myself, as the dealer (last time) charged me $7 per quart of Mobil 1 and said they used 6 quarts of oil. Too many dealers seem to be rip-off places.

captain howdy

How the hell did you figure the average minimum mileage for all HHRs in 22 MPG? Don't drive in the city much do you? My maximum is 22 MPG. I've seen it get up to 23 MPG once. I'm usually in the 18-20 MPG range combined city and highway. And no that's not driving like a race car driver or anything. That's obeying all speed limits, traffic lights, and signs without hard accelerating. On the throughway I might open my HHR up a bit but nothing insane and not too often because I drive mainly on city roads with lots of stop and go. There is no tuning the dealer can do to get me better mileage. I just have to live with it because of the driving conditions around here. I still think that 18-20 MPG isn't bad so I'm not disappointed what so ever. Didn't Lee say he was averaging something like 10 MPG in N.Y. City?

an08HHR

Hey Captain, I only said 22 because the gov fuel economy (www.fueleconomy.gov) state it should be 22-28 w/2.4L and 22-30 w/2.2L but we all know it will vary. But 190 mile to fill the HHR, something is wrong. Not knowing exactly how many gals HipHotRod took to fill that tank is a question. If it was empty and only went 190 miles, well that is only 11.9 mpg. Heck, didn't you get rid of a Ford Explorer that got better. I just got rid of a Ram SLT that had no problem getting up to 60 mph by the time a light changed to green and got 14.3mpg.
I'm doing mix driving so far and the dic is 22.5 av. on a new engine.

MWG2

WELCOME to the "Rear Sway Bar Believers Club!" The sway bar really, really does make a difference. I say it all the time (I'm sure the members here are sick of hearing me say it!)

Now, go get some good tires and really feel the performance.

I too "dig" my little HHR. HEY, let's get the Beach Boys to write a car song about the HHR!!!!

Peace,

MWG2

afs9

I've gotten to the point where I leave the DIC on the miles left in the tank screen as frankly, it goes up and down when I drive and I really don't know how much gas this tank takes to fill up and/or what my mileage is. (I fill when I get to 1/4 tank).

The highest the tank mileage has shown after a fill-up is 345, but it usually 'fills' around 298-300. I did notice the higher number was due to driving on the highway that week. I only drive about 100-125 miles a week (not counting weekends) in stop and go traffic...

Dumb questions--does driving with the sunroof open or popped up a factor for mileage?

I'm confused...but whatever, I still save more on gas $ then when I drove my trusty S10 and I LOVE driving my little car!

captain howdy

I don't trust the government fuel economy crap or what the manufacturer states. Now I see how you came up with 22 MPG though. 190 does seem pretty low but possible. Especially if the vehicle sees a lot of city stop and go driving. The lowest I think I've ever seen my HHR after a fill up has been in the upper 200s. Like somewhere around 275 - 280 miles.