Attention

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not represent our advertisers

Friday, July 24, 2009

The Truth About Premium Fuel

Fuel Grades: Can I Save Money By Going 87?

The little two-passenger smart fortwo is the most fuel-efficient car (not counting hybrids) in the U.S. market, with EPA fuel economy ratings of 33 mpg city, 41 highway. For high-mileage frugality, it appears to beat the five-passenger Toyota Yaris and its 29/35-mpg ratings by a long shot.

But wait! Premium fuel -- which cost about 12 percent more than regular at U.S. pumps last month -- is required for the smart car. Suddenly the gap closes and the Smart no longer looks like as strong of a fuel-budget buster.

GO HERE to learn more.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Actually my Yaris gets closer to 40mpg when my wife drives it. I should mention that its a stick, and when I drive it, well, I don't even want to know what my mpg is.

We looked into the smart cars before we bought the Yaris and found them to be too impractical for us. They were also $4000 more than our Yaris.

Anonymous said...

If you're dumb enough to look at the "smart" car as fuel efficient or even environmentally friendly then you should really be looking at a bike or two-they carry the same load but of these options one is so environmentally friendly it uses no gas and requires no oil or battery dispozal.

Chimera said...

The "smart"car is a gimmick.

Anonymous said...

I could give a crap about either of these cars, but if you do the math with 12000 miles of all city driving per year and the 12 cent differential in fuel price ($2.40/gal reg - $2.52/gal prem.) the smart car still costs $76.73 less in fuel cost. If you factor in equal amount of highway driving where the MPG really widens, then the statement in this article is correct. The smart car beats the Toyota hands down.

Anonymous said...

I wouldn't care if the "smart" car got 10000 miles/gal.
I wouldn't set foot in that piece of @@@@ or the Toyota Pious either!

Anonymous said...

As for the Prius that I just bought with the help of taxpayers under the Clunker program, I got 62.7 MPG from my last tank of gas (11.9 gal). I have tons of space compared to the SMART car as well.