[ale] way OT - used car buying tips - yea or nea - PT 2

[Sean Kilpatrick]

About a year ago we purchased a new Hyundai Santa Fe AWD to use as a tow 
vehicle.  After using it to haul our 1-ton camping trailer through 
Colorado to the west coast and then up into the Canadian Rockies I can 
comment on a few things Ron mentioned.

Fuel economy:  The latest version of the 3.5 V6 is rated at 275 bhp, but 
those are Clydesdales, not quarter horses.  They need more oats.  I didn't 
hesitate to let the engine spool up to 4500 rpm climbing 10,000 foot 
mountain passes in the Rockies -- at 65 mph, while pulling the trailer. 
Gas mileage suffered! :)

For the whole trip we averaged about 17.5 while towing and anywhere from 
18 - 22 when not.  I have never owned a car that was as sensitive as this 
one to different brands of gasoline.  Best mileage was in Canada, where 
they do NOT add ethanol to the petrol.

The best widget I purchased for the trip was the Scan Guage II.

http://www.scangauge.com/

This plugs into the OBDI port under the dash and allows constant readout 
of nearly every variable the engine's computer is tracking.  Displays any 
four. Especially useful for towing are the (near) instant fuel economy and 
water temp.  The temp. gauge in this car is a joke.  It looks like a 
regular temp gauge, but it really has only three positions: cold, normal, 
and overheated.  It shows as "normal" anything from 157F to 223F, the 
highest I have seen so far.

To put the fuel economy into some perspective, this V6 is producing more 
drive-wheel horsepower than many of the muscle cars of the late 60s with 
their hulking, ginormous V8s -- which got 12-15 mpg IF you only touched 
the gas pedal with a feather-light foot.  Those four-barrel carbs were 
thirsty!

The 2013 version of the car no longer comes with the V6 -- only a regular 
4-banger and a turbo-four.  Couldn't find anything on tow capacity, but I 
suspect it is now limited to one ton.  The V6 is rated to tow up to 3500 
lbs with trailer brakes.

Bottom line: strong engines with lots of torque are thirsty.  Those little 
turbocharged 4-bangers produce enough horsepower at high revs while 
sipping gas, but are gutless coming away from a stop, especially up hill 
with a load.  We need the grunt factor, so we put up with the fuel 
mileage.  If we didn't we'd have a much smaller car with a turbo-four and 
enjoy 40% - 50% better fuel economy.

Sean

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