2010 Volkswagen GTI: How Do You Like Me Now?

The difference in the price increases now is that they are not going down this time. This is the new normal for the next few years. With the mid east turmoil, the current admin, the quake in Japan and the huge thirst for oil in China and India the price will not fall anytime soon.

The last tank on my wifes Prius was 47MPG and my Stratus was 28......we can live with that for now but if gas goes to 5 or 6 a gallon then we will have to do something different. I cannot and will not be a slave to an automobile.

It sure does require premium.

Even if it's not required, why cheap out on premium if it's recommended?

If you're buying 10 gallons of gasoline, it's only 2-3 dollars per fill-up more in most cases. The price of gas fluctuates, but the difference between regular and premium is pretty constant. As gas prices rise there is actually less and less of a difference between grades proportionally. What's the difference between spending 40 dollars and 42 dollars?

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that fuel economy also goes down a bit when the vehicle adjusts to a lower grade. At 25 mpg and 4.00 regular / 4.20 premium, let's say the car drops 1 mpg on regular. With premium, your costs (1/25 * 4.2) are 16.8 cents per mile, with regular (1/24 * 4) it's 16.7 cents per mile. On 10 gallons of fuel, you've saved yourself less than 2 cents ((.168 * 250) - (.167 * 240)=1.92).

Okay, I ignored my use of decimal points there pretty badly, I'll give you that you've almost saved the full 2 dollars of difference. Ignore my second paragraph.

I still say that 2 dollars is a relatively insignificant amount, though.

I could put up with 25 mpg for a car that drives like the GTI. In fact, are there any hot hatches that use less fuel? Just keep the turbo quiet until you need it. And 20 cents a gallon when gas is $4? That's only 5% more to put premium in.

The Yaris sedan we bought in 07 during the last gas price spike is going to come in real handy if this keeps up. Certainly good at squelching V6 envy.

In a word: no. I thought those things averaged 28+ ?

My civic Si with similar HP averaged 33mpg and my 305hp Mustang averages 28. I've heard LA traffic is pretty insane but I expected a lot higher than 24.

And to think I was yelling at 3.37 for 93 oct.

Granted the car is one of the better hot hatches, but that comes with a cost and that mpg. Im thinking it must be working way to hard at what it does. Im thinking a 6 cyl would have been a better bet, as it doesnt have to work as hard.

My G8 gets 20.8 mpg on a bad week. I have avg'ed around 24. This is a 400hp 4100 lbs car and I can hit within 1-2 mpg on an given day? Keep in mind this is with AFM mode tuned out. I could be avg'ing around 5-10% more.

If your vehicle is paid for and it gets the reasonable 23-26 mpg, then just keep it. If you are making payments on your car and can buy a more fuel efficient car for the same payment, then buy it.

You can't really make out by trading in for a fuel efficient car if you then need to take on a big monthly payment and/or put out a large down payment.

I own a 11' GTI DSG. It does require premium fuel and I average just over 30mpg - car only has 2500 mi. I'm sure mpg will improve once as the engine continues to break-in. For me 30mpg is more than acceptable in a car this fun.

@bodyblue: I'm not so sure about that. Japan is not an oil producing country, and any economic downturn caused by the natural disaster will reduce fuel demand from that country further. China's economic growth is slowing, and even before that supply was more than enough to support demand. And do you think any new regimes in the Middle East are going to permanently give up exporting oil? There would be no reason for that.

premium is required, look at the gas door.

http://i998.photobucket.com/albums/af109/thisistan/vw/f1515654.jpg

how are you getting only 24.6mpg??? I'm getting 27mpg driving equally city and highway.

So leave your dignity at the curb and climb down into a clown car like the Mazda 2 at 31.2 mpg instead.

Those 21,500 miles could have cost you $2783 at 4.039/gallon.

In the GTI, drinking premium at 4.239, $3705.

A $900 saving for almost two years worth of driving for an average owner.

Keep some perspective.

So since Carroll possibly filled it up with the wrong fuel, what sort of damage could occur?

fsunole,

I'd bet that it will probably be fine. I drive a Mazdaspeed3 and the owner's manual says that regular grade gasoline can be used without causing harm, but will cause lower performance and mileage.

I think that as long as the engine doesn't start knocking, there shouldn't be problems.

It depends on how much you drive. My next daily driver will have to get at least 35 mpg highway, most of my miles are highway and rural roads. I average about 32K miles per year most of which is my daily commute, 125 miles round trip.

@fsunole: For one tank I doubt it will cause any damage, the engine should adjust to the lower octane fuel.

"You can't really make out by trading in for a fuel efficient car if you then need to take on a big monthly payment and/or put out a large down payment."

People panic and just HAVE to buy a fuel efficient car- and usually the math doesn't support their frantic decision. For example, I saw a nice 2010 Mini Cooper equipped just the way I'd want one(except that it had a big hole in the roof). I could probably trade my MS3 and wind up paying $10000 OTD. The Mini averages 39 mpg while my Mazda returns 23.5 mpg. Driving 16000 miles annually with gas at $4.00 per gallon I would save $95 per month. However -even assuming that I paid cash for the Cooper- I would still have to drive the car for almost nine years before I broke even(10000/95= 105.26 months, or 8.77 years).

"People panic and just HAVE to buy a fuel efficient car- and usually the math doesn't support their frantic decision."

BINGO! Besides, if the Golf is set up to run on Premium, it will retard the ignition when running on regular. This alone will probably eat most of the 5% price advantage in reduced gas mileage. False economy, IMHO.

I wonder how much the savings will be if you already paid off your 15-16 MPG gas guzzler (truck, SUV.)

Some are more than willing to put up with 5/gallon than plunk down the cash for even a pre-owned gas sipper.

My GTI averages 28.5

Compared to my 2006 Audi S4 averaging 19 mpg it's a huge step forward with only small step backward is perceived performance.

I can't think of too many other cars capable of nearly 30mpg that are also this much fun and practical.

Could I use more economy? Absolutely, but not at the expense of performance. I wasn't willing to go TDi for an extra 7-10mpg

I actually believe the 24.6 mpg. I live in NYC with a mix of city/hwy and my 06' TSX avg's 24mpg. "City" driving seems to be relative to where you live- especially if you get stuck in heavy stop-and-go traffic.

If MPG were my biggest concern, I'd go with a used prius or a new elantra =)

I have been averaging about 29 mpg in my gti, driving it like I did my old fit, instead of the gti that it is. (Makes me want a fit again)

With the way premium is here, I miss not needing fifty bucks to fill up. But as far as sport compacts go, save for the mini, the gti does great mileage wise. Had you guys gotten the dsg, it'd be even better...they are rated at like 32 or 33 mpg highway. Mine is 29.

Imagine if you guys still had the speed3...the hwy rating isn't much more than the gti's city rating.

And yes, not putting 91 is going to hurt mpg. I wonder how much better (and faster) the car would be ig you had 93 available

I'm looking at the link that was provided for "premium recommended" and "premium required," and I noticed that the 2008 Audi A3 is on the "required" list, while the 2008 GTI is on the "recommended" list, don't both of them have the same 2.0T? Or is Audi just pulling our leg? Premium fuel for a "premium brand?" Maybe it's just some calibration...worth Looking into before you start putting regular in there...

based on the kinds of cars I read people own on this board (i.e. not a 1986 caprice)...gas at $6/gallon x miles you drive isnt going to impact your lives at all when it comes. I could probably bag my lunch 1 more day a week and save more than enough between the $4 -> $6 difference I drive.

The horror.

I'm impressed with the gas mileages fellow GTI owners are getting above -- if they are actual figures (dividing trip odo by pump gallons), not using the 2mpg optimistic MFI display. My 10K MT GTI (stock ECU) has been getting 18-22mpg on 93 octane through a VT winter, admittedly short hops around town, but not on boost (much) either. I've barely broken 30mpg once on a long easy interstate trip, more often high-20s. No indication otherwise anything is wrong with the car, it pulls good numbers on the dyno...

It's really time for VW to bring over the 60MPG(US) Polo Bluemotion. Sadly, 24.6MPG (sounds like a lot of city driving) with Premium gas is the price to pay for a performance engine. It's true, this will be the price level after the spike in the summer.

@milleman:
I'm averaging a self-calculated 25MPG with my '11 (the MDI reads about 27). It's got about 3K on the odometer right now, so I suspect that it's still breaking in. My driving is about 90-95% surface streets here in AZ, and the only way I could average 29MPG is if I got every green light in town AND somebody disconnected the turbo :)

I'm using the MDI readout. I didn't realize it was that far off. So that means I'm really at 26.5 which is still better than my old S4, though it's not close to the magic 30mpg mark.

Now you have me worried my S4 may have also been 2 mpg off. That would put it at 17mpg. Ouch. No wonder I felt like that car had almost 0 range.

I'm averaging 28.2mpg on Toptier gas (Shell 93) by MDI on my '10 GTI DSG, so probably closer to 25-26mpg, but it's still better than my '07 Honda Civic Sedan Auto averaging 23mpg in the same driving conditions (?!) - and oh so much more practical and fun.

Oh, and has anyone noticed that while the price of gas jumped immediately with oil prices, now that oil prices have started falling, gas prices haven't? (Spot crude today: $99/bbl)

The dealers can actually correct the average mpg reading on the MDI. Mine is perfect now, but I did have to endure one gas-guzzling software update (from 27.5 to 25.5 yikes!) for about 10k miles. I am now back on the 27ish average mpg software. I'm on the FSI engine though, the TSI is rated better. I have still never gotten below 21 mpg and never above 30 mpg on a tank, no matter how hard I try.