Good gas mileage small pickup.

[Valv]

I am looking to park my full size dually diesel, and use a small pickup for daily traveling.

It will be used, not new. Must be a 4 cylinders and standard transmission, no V6 or automatics.

4x4 would be great, but 4x2 might be ok.

What are the ACTUAL gas mileage I could get.

I want the truth, not a show-off contest (my truck is better than yours), and cannot be a battle on which brand it's best. I am a moderator here and I can zap anybody that crosses the line, so please stick to the topic

What do you get for mpg with your small pickup ?

[Wishin2BFishin]

I don't have a pickup but I just looked on kbb.com (Kelly Blue Book) and they have reviews on cars and trucks there. A 2005 Toyota Tacoma 4X4 pickup 4 cyl 5 speed gets 19 mpg city and 23 highway. Believe it or not if your planning to have a topper and carry stuff around a 6 cyl may get you better mpg than a 4 cyl because a 4 cyl works harder than a 6 cyl would. Best of luck...

[rundrave]

I have the 4cyl, 2.7L Toyota tacoma 4x4, my mileage is similar to post above. Its not a V8, so a little gutless when pulling things but its a 5spd so that helps. It will pull a boat out of the water no problem, and I have even pulled stuff long distances with no issues as well.

Hands down reliability in a Toyota CANNOT be beat, and if your particular to the old USA american made, thats where they are made beleive it or not.

good luck to you and your search.

[HARPOON-OR-BUST]

Quote:

---

I want the truth, not a show-off contest (my truck is better than yours), and cannot be a battle on which brand it's best. I am a moderator here and I can zap anybody that crosses the line, so please stick to the topic

What do you get for mpg with your small pickup ?

---

Quote:

---

Hands down reliability in a Toyota CANNOT be beat

---

MMMM WHERE WAS THE MILAGE? THAT DIDN'T TAKE LONG!!

[rundrave]

Quote:

---

I have the 4cyl, 2.7L Toyota tacoma 4x4, my mileage is similar to post above.

---

[JollyT]

I had a 2 wheel drive, 1993 Ford Ranger, with 4 cyl. and 5 speed. Got 22-23 all around average, maybe 26-26 on long trips. No a/c though! I would guess a newer one would be about the same as they haven't changed that much if you could find one. I'm guessing there aren't many out there.

I really miss my 1991 Metro. Kept a log, 50.2 mpg. Only cost $7000 brand new. Used it for my job. Made out great on mileage.

[ChuckN]

'93 Ranger 4x4 2.3L standard cab, 5 speed, short box - 22mpg highway.

'92 Ranger 4x4 Ext Cab 4.0L V6 auto OD tranny - 22mpg+ highway.

I really got the same or better mileage from the V6 engine over the 4cyl. Better performance and I could tow larger items.

Never owned a 2WD truck.

[Surface Tension]

I got 17 MPG with my 1978 454 Chev 3/4 ton on the highway.

1985 Chev 305 1/2 ton got 23 MPG.

My newer truck gets 13 MPG.

[Guest]

ST has a good point with the newer vehicles getting worse gas mileage. My Nissan Pathfinder(V6) is a 91 and it gets about 24 mpg on the average while the newer models are lucky to get 15.

I have only had a couple pick ups with 4 cyl engines. I cant recall any of them having noticably better mileage than early fuel injected V6(around 1990) trucks.

Imports are generally a little better in the mileage department... I had a late 80's nissan pickup(2wd with 4 cyl) that got the same amount of miles out of the 16 gallon tank as my truck that followed (chev pickup with V8) with a 30 gallon tank. I dont remember the mileage exactly on the nissan, but it was in the low 20 mpg range average.

[Valv]

ST is dead on !!!

I was looking at the new F150 thinking they are great on gas.....no way, we are going backward here people !!!!

I asked the question since talking to many peoeple I noticed mpg is not as great as I thought. And in this case I rather have a full size V8 and the power when I need than a little toy (ok the "ota" is optional ) truck that I cannot do anything with it.

My Dodge gets 16mpg always with a 4:10 rearend, if I buy a 3:50 Cummins I will get 19mpg.

[Jeremy airjer W]

Hey Valv,

I think you should take a good look at the Ford Ranger...... Gotcha!!

95 Toyota Tacoma, extended cab, lx, 4x4, 5 speed manuel, 2.7 litre inline 4 cylinder. 23+ in the summer highway, 19 with an 18 foot lund ('81), 16 with a large uhaul trailer loaded to the gills and the box also loaded to the gills driving seventy into a head wind for 230 miles!

130,000 miles, a set of tires, 1 ujoint, a set of front brakes, a starter, a battery and thats it for major repairs.

Oh, Oh, Oh, what a feelin', TOYOTA!

[Valv]

Quote:

---

Oh, Oh, Oh, what a feelin', TOYOTA!

---

No way, no way, you won't catch me driving a Toyota truck......well maybe, I guess.

Honestly I thought there was more difference from large motors, but for just 4mpg/5mpg difference I don't know if I want to give up the full size.

If you were talking 28mpg highway, I will consider it, but when you take in consideration the cost of purchsing a used one, even cheap which means at least $ 2000, I cannot see where my savings will be unless I use it for thousands and thousands of miles every year, which won't happen.

I think I will have to go look for an old VW Rabbit Pickup with the diesel motor, that used to do 35mpg or better....

[Jarrod32]

Does it need to be a pickup, or can it be a small SUV? My wife drives a 2000 Chevy Tracker with a four-cylinder engine and a five-speed manual transmission, and she gets low 30's for mileage on the highway.

I have to think that a compact 4x2 pickup with a four-cylinder and a manual transmission would get high 20's...

My Dodge Dakota 6-cylinder gets about 19 on the highway...

[FoolNFish]

How about my 1988 Ford Ranger STX extended cab 4X4

198000 miles on it and still going strong

2.9L 6cyl. 5spd. only thing ever redone was the clutch and it still gets an honest 20+mpg

[jltimm]

Another Toyota "lifer" here!1997 Toyota Tacoma 3.4 ltr V6 auto tranny,4x4 extra cab.19-22 hwy in the summer17-19 putzing around.And you are right about the not much of a difference thing between full size and midsize.Although this is my third Toyota truck and I cannot recommend a more reliable vehicle with great resale value!

[get-the-net]

Val, I had a 94 Nissan V6 4x4 manual that got around 20 on the hwy. I moved "up" to a F150 (auto) with the 5.4L and routinely get 17 on the hwy. My brother has a 98 F150 (auto) with the 4.6 and he gets 14 on the hwy. Smaller engine usually = harder working engine. What I suggest is that you skip on down to South America and get yourself one of the small pickups with a diesel engine that every other country in the world seems to have available. I talked with some reps from the major automakers and they claim that there isn't enough demand here for little pickups that get 30+ mpg on the highway. I guess they figure if you get a diesel, you automatically want to haul 16 tons around every day.

[JohnMickish]

My wife drives a Hyundi (sp?) Santa Fe, gets 21 around town and 25 on the highway. I hate to say it but for the money it's one heck of a vehicle. Now concerning the decreasing millage on new pickups that's easy to explain. In 1985 you had a 190 horse 305ci. Now you have 345 horse 6.0 litre. It takes dead dinasours to feed them horses, and the bigger the heard, the more gas it takes.

[vikzilla]

I drive 95 miles to work round trip.

Been driving a 4 X 2 S-10 Pickup 4 cyl. for 277K miles. I get 25 MPG and no problems other than normal maintenance.

Fellow I work with has the same setup in a Ford ranger. 30 MPG and 310K miles. I think he's full of it on the 30, but 25 would be about right.

You can't beat these two setups for mileage and utility. 3 to 4 mpg doesn't sound like much until you figure 25k a year and 2.50 gas. It adds up real fast.

[caseymcq]

I have an '03 Ranger Ext Cab FX4 with a 4.0L and I routinely get 19 mpg. If I really watch how I put my foot into the pedal or I have a long trip where I am not going over 65 mph much I get 23 mpg. I pull an Alumacraft Navigator 175 with a 75 hp Yammy and the milage only drops to about 16 mpg.

mnfishinguy, I too like your signature. I read it and it made me chuckle.

[wellsupplyguy]

I have an inline 5-cylinder auto tranny and 4wheel drive and get about 22-23 mpg

[Valv]

Get-the-net you have my full endorsement here !!! I wish we could have small trucks with small diesels.

I don't need 350hp to go to the parts store, I need a 115hp that uses 4 times less fuel than my full size.

I am looking at another Dodge Cummins but 12 valves, 5 speed, with a 3:50 rear end it does 19mpg/20mpg highway, no need for small size anymore.

FoolNFish, yes you are going to get zapped, and you deserve it.

Also you are going to get warned here publicly not to do it again, that was intentional and not called for.

[JollyT]

Too bad VW doesn't make a small pickup like they the old days. Now I know it wasn't really a pickup, but a buddy had two of them with the diesel engines. He drove almost 100 miles one way for work and got about 62 mpg on the highway. He ran them both well over 200k.

[Luck e 1]

Doesn't Chevy have a full sized Hybrid Truck? That may help on mileage...but only if the price doesn't kill any gas savings.

[Jeremy airjer W]

Luck e 1, I think it was a tahoe/yukon. If I remeber right the fuel economy was only 1 or two miles better than the non highbred. 1 step forward 2 steps back!

[Jarrod32]

GM has a flex-fuel engine...some versions of the 5.3 will run on e-85. That engine is in some trucks and SUVs (Tahoes, Yukons). I think that they are coming out with a full-size hybrid (electric) truck early next year.

[Mr. Bear]

If you really want to save on gas, you might want to consider going away from a pick-up all together. I drive an old Camry for day to day stuff and get low 30s mileage. If you went smaller, you could do even better. It gets me from here to there and driving costs are very low. Then I've got my big old beater truck for haulin stuff. I don't drive it enough to care about a couple mpgs, just initial cost and maintenance. I don't care if I scratch it either. I just did the math and even though I love all these activities where I haul toys around, I found that 90% of my driving is something any old go-cart could handle.

But, your needs and taste could be different than mine. That's the beauty of it, ain't it.