I am thinking of buying the Patriot Sport with Manual Trans. Can somebody tell me if it runs good at 75 MPH, because I do a lot of traveling on the Interstate and that is the normal speed. also.. How and when.. do you put it into "Overdrive".. or.. is that simply 5th gear??
Will the Stick Shift get any better MPG than the Automatic?

Thanks for your help.

EddyJ:

I have the stick shift...Overdrive is essentially the 5th Gear. I'm averaging about 26-27MPG at this point. I noticed a hit on the gas mileage when I travel at higher speeds...not a huge difference, but it's noticable. I've only put 800 miles on it (it's was a week old yesterday). I noticed the EVIC readout dropping steadily when I was cruising at 70mph the other day. Just in the short time i've had it, I've noticed that the best gas mileage seems to come when I keep the highway speeds under 60mph...but again the engine is still being broken in....so I'm sure it'll improve.

The CVT Does get worse gas mileage than the maual transmission.

Just my $.02

Spencer

I am thinking of buying the Patriot Sport with Manual Trans. Can somebody tell me if it runs good at 75 MPH, because I do a lot of traveling on the Interstate and that is the normal speed. also.. How and when.. do you put it into "Overdrive".. or.. is that simply 5th gear??
Will the Stick Shift get any better MPG than the Automatic?

Thanks for your help.

EddyJ:

It is a 5th gear, not sure I have seen a manual transmission with "overdrive".

No issues with 120 km/hr (75 mph), drives quite nicely and no abnormally high RPM. As with any engine the faster you go, fuel efficiency is impacted.

Well not to brag, but being stationed in Germany I can chime in and say my FD1 with 5 Spd runs great out the autobahn... I am no speed racer but have ran up and down the roads in excess of 80 and once even had it up to 100 with even blinking or skipping a beat. I highly recommend the Patriot. But do realize when driving that fast your mileage will definately drop!

I am no speed racer but have ran up and down the roads in excess of 80 and once even had it up to 100 with even blinking or skipping a beat.


I do that in Detroit. If I were in Germany, I would be running 125mph + !!!

In the old days, overdrive meant a trasmission system where the output shaft turned faster than the input. These days, most transmissions have a top gear where the output shaft turns faster than the input. 5th gear on the '08's is supposed to be .72:1.

Again, in the old days, the overdrive unit was bolted on the back of the transmission, so you could multiply the gears in the transmission by the two in the overdive. Overdrive 2nd gear might work out to be pretty close to the same as third gear with direct drive, so you didn't necessarily end up with six useful ratios. Some people even put an overdrive unit on old 3 speed automatics or four speed manuals. Then the factories started putting more gears in the transmission, with the highest being an overdrive.

With six speed transmissions, 5th and 6th may both be "overdrive" ratios.

FWIW and YRMV (Your Ratios May Vary). :)