I don't do alot of highway driving, but I routinely pull around 18 mpg with nothing but stop and go, and I don't have a light foot.

 

I usually get 18mpg in town. I was getting 20 or 21mpg with a 50/50 mix of highway and in town. The best I've got has been 24 mpg on a trip to Florida doing 80mph with the A/C on. The worst I got was 3 mpg while doing blasts down the 1/8 mile.

 

It sure is - if I'm taking down a brick wall, I know what tool I'm going to use. It isn't going to be a light ballpeen hammer that's easy to swing. It's amazing how miserly a big V8 is when it's not stuffed in a 3-ton barn-sized SUV (it's also interesting to note how inefficient those fancy smaller motors are when put into SUVs).

Guy, I haven't looked at much of the sales figures for June-to-date and probably didn't look as closely at the May sales as I should have, but I seem to recall exactly the opposite of what you posted. Regardless, pickup truck sales will be much more resistant to gas price hikes than SUVs, but eventually, the poseurs will go elsewhere and sales will soften somewhat (I'd expect the highly-optioned half-tons to drop off first). And the ultimate point is that it's not us high-perf guys who are sucking down the most fuel right now, so I don't expect fuel prices to affect performance cars much at all right now - it's not like we're buying a bunch of 8-10 MPG big-blocks that are ****-poorly tuned from the factory.

 

I understand that an LSX F-body or Vette can get quite decent mileage, but try telling that to the rest of the general public who see v8 and shudder. It's hard for me to imagine, gas is 3$ USD a litre here and climbing quite rapidly.

 

This weekend, In Wichita, KS, I filled up my SS with premium at $2.10 a gallon (includes a 6 cent per gallon discount with "loyalty" card.)

Let's say it went to $4 a gallon. Would I get rid of my SS with my beloved LS1? Not a chance!!!

I would change other spending habits, though. I'd probably eat out less.

This whole argument, as I see it, really comes down to discretionary spending and personal choice. I choose my LS1.

 

Its true they do shudder at the though of a V8! I had on 2 occassions, 2 seperate characters in my home "shudder", as you put it, when they saw the Z out front! One guy was an old guy who seemed to be giving me weird looks, as he muttered under his breath something about how we really needed a car like that, and wouldn't believe my claims of low mpg. ( I said around 25 or so ), to which he snapped back and said, " I doubt that"! The other was a middle aged guy, and I noticed right off he was checking out my collection of model cars around the house (with an angry look)! I couldn't figure out his deal, till I walked him out and saw the prius! So quickly, all I could come up with as he left was, "Your not pulling down 70+ mpg with that are you", he wouldn't give me any #'s put his head down and left! Oh, and the old guy was looking strangely at my car collection as well, but he was in a little POS too, honda I think, not sure but it was small. I guess hot rodders are bad UMM KAYY!!! Somehow , the people aren't getting the facts straight about the big bad American V8's! I wonder how that could be!

 

But you are already in the club. The question is going to be will people on the outside buy in and say...drop their dime on a big V8 when gas gets to like 4 bucks a gallon for regular and 4.50 for premium or will they trundle some place else.

While I agree the SUVs are going to get hit first the concern is will it drag down anything V8 powered with it?

This power boom is going to end. No question about it. Just hope things can be done to extended a bit. Just this time hopefully people will take care of these wonderful cars so in 40 years people won't be paying 100s of thousands of dollars for cars that even adjusted for inflation might be worth 22-25k.

 

Its not stopping me from hopefully buying a GXP in the next few weeks with a big ol' 5.3 sucking down 93 octane

Assume this car gets 20 MPG. My current GP gets around 25. I drive, on average, around 300 miles a week. So, the '01 uses 12 gallons, while the GXP will use around 15. My weekly gas bill based on 87 octance for the GP is $26.40 roughly, while the GXP will be $36.00. Again, this assumes my new 18/27 rated car gets 20 while my 20/30 current car gets 25...I dare say the GXP will do better than 20 under my use.

For AT MOST $10 a week? I'll take the GXP and keep trucking, thanks very much...