75-80mph gas mileage
 

Hi,

I'm in the market for a used car. I'll be keeping my Accent and paying someone cash. I'd like to spend under 10K. The one thing I don't like about the Accent and never have is the gearing. I'm running about 4,000 RPM on the interstate @ 75-80mph. I want the used car I buy to be more of a highway cruiser but I still want decent gas mileage. I put 100 miles per day on my work cars and it's almost all @ highway speeds. Any suggestions?

GM and Ford large cars will get 30mpg on long highway drives at those speeds. They have decently efficient V8 engines and the tall gears that you need to really take advantage of that, often combined with decent aerodynamics.

If you want low RPM's on the highway you really need a large American sedan. The best highway mileage seems to come from the Ford products. I'd try to get a Crown Vic or Grand Marquis made in the last 20 years. The fuel injected 302 with automatic overdrive. My family has had many over the years. Even a barge like my great aunt's 88 Lincoln Town Car did well on the highway. I don't know about constant cruising at 80, but my Grandfather's Grand Marquis will do mid to upper 20's while cruising effortlessly at 70. Size isn't as important when you're talking about highway mileage.

EDIT: HC posted a reply at the same time I did, and said pretty much the same thing.

I've become partial to front wheel drive since I got this Accent. I like to stay with that here in snowy Illinois.

My car does 25% mpg better at 75mph than the GM or Ford large car.
I have a manual 6 gearbox=> around 3000 rpm at 75mph for a 1.4 engine.

my father-in-law has an impala SS and he can get 30ish on the highway. his is a supercharged v6. I think it is front wheel drive and being that his is an '04, they should be around the 10k price range by now (I assume on that one)

maybe even a regular impala could do you on that note. he drives for his job and his 2004 impala which he bought brand new has just over 210k on it. he plans to drive it to 300k and trade it in.

his last car was a caprice classic with the police motor package (not sure the name police interceptor or something) traded it in with 298k on the clock.

The police package on a Caprice was referred to as a "9C1" which was the production code for the police package.

i'll second the GM choice, especially the impala. the 3.4 liter in recent models claims 32mpg hwy. the kicker is, you could actually get a 2000-2005 model in your $10k range WITH A WARRANTY!!!

i just finished looking for a new(er) vehicle and was surprised at the offering of warranties on such vehicles. could be the economy. they vary anywhere from 60 days to a full year, and i've even seen a 2 year or 100k (total odometer)miles warranty. naturally it will depend on the dealership and the year/miles of the vehicle. happy searching!

These suggestions are dumb.. OP: either get a Civic VX, Geo Metro, Chevrolet Sprint, Civic/Prius Hybrid or just change out the final drive in your accent's transmission. Void warranty? Sure.. but it'd void the warranty JUST on the transmission. You can either do the least risky and buy another car or you can just go out and change the final drive which won't be too hard on a M/T. You'll have to get someone to fabricate a final drive for you and you'll have to know how to remove the transmission and replace said part, but I think overall that's cheaper than getting another car. Maybe the simplest solution would be to just get the transmission from the Accent Blue and put it in, keep your original transmission just in case there is a problem. But a taller final drive is really all you need and if you do bother to do what I suggested, you may find that you want an [i]even taller[i/] final drive and therefore will probably require some fabrication.

BTW guys, he is already averaging 30-32mpg, so going to one of these "boats" wouldn't exactly bump up his mileage.

*************, I think you may not have read his question the same way I did:
That tells me that he's looking for a larger more comfortable car.
That sounds like he's willing to sacrifice some FE but not a lot.