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Maximizing hybrid Ford Maverick efficiency

This is not an authoritative post, and I'm not an expert, but the Maverick is an interesting vehicle and my first Toyota-style hybrid. "Toyota-styled" hybrids are miraculous in was I didn't previously understand. The best resource to go to understand this is probably this excellent video from Technology Connections.

How does a Maverick Hybrid work?

The short version would be something like:

It's worth noting as well, that the gas engine comes on (as far as I can tell) under three conditions:

Gas mileage

This explains the challenge of getting amazing (rather than merely good) gas mileage out of a Ford Maverick. (and if my explanation does not make sense, I really do encourage you to watch the Technology Connections video.) In other words, you almost have two modes of driving; normal driving and hypermiling. The same could sort of be said for any vehicle, but for the Maverick (or any Toyota-style hybrid) but for the Maverick this means something more specific: Under normal driving, you're mostly going to be using the gas engine, and so you're going to get the approximately 40 MPG it can produce. Under ideal conditions, a significant portion of the driving can be done on the batter only. The engine will still need to run at points (we'll get into this) but you can regularly pull 55-60 MPG, and under even-more-ideal scenarios can easily hit *70-90 MPG.

Now before I want to go any further, the average driver is probably going to get 38-45 MPG out of a Maverick, and I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. However, it's worth understanding what conditions can maximize its fuel economy, as its potential mileage is much higher than what most people will get. Some of the factors which impact fuel economy are environmental, while some are behavioral. At its core is the question of just how much you're using the gas engine. Let's lay out a few scenarios.

Scenarios

hills

Conceptually, the same old-fashioned hypermiling tricks apply the same way here: you want to coast as much as you can uphill, and accelerate as much as you can downhill, but with a couple of caveats. The Maverick (as noted) will power on its engine when the drive requests enough acceleration. So when you crest past the center of a dip and begin to climb the hill, you see a sharper relative drop in MPG than a normal vehicle would. On the way down the hill, you need no engine power at all and may actually be making power charging the battery. ie, you swing from the ideal to the worst scenario between hills an valleys.

Obviously, the answer is that when possible try to accelerate as little as possible up hills. Ideally, accelerate little enough that your engine does not cycle on. This will obviously be impossible depending on the hill, but the principle is simple.

short trips

Short trips are actually a bit confusing. Some vehicles could potentially see good mileage on short trips, however given that the Maverick's maintenance systems want to power on the engine and get it to a minimum operation temperature, a short trip in the Maverick can see some of its worst MPG. (~29-30 MPG) Somewhat unintuitively, the best solution here is actually to get the gas engine on as early as possible in the trip. ie, once the engine warms up, you get more of the benefit from the hybrid system. So, on a short trip, you don't necessarily want to hypermile at first; you want to warm the engine up, and then start hypermiling. However, if you can get from a->b without actually needing the engine to cycle on (ie, no hills, no strong acceleration, no high speeds) then you could briefly get the ideal mileage.

highway speed cruising

In principle, you're going 70 MPH on the highway, you're at high speeds, you're running the engine constantly, and so this is why the Maverick hybrid is rated for 35 MPG highway. This is not wrong, but even here there are things you can do improve this.

This won't be popular with most people (and is inadvisable on crowded highways) but you can help the Maverick out significantly by merely going slowly on the highway. 62 MPH seems to be the sweet spot (where I live) between not annoying other drivers too much and allowing the Maverick to get the best MPG. When I am on the highway, and it's either flat or downhill, I am often in EV-only mode. My assumption is that at 62 MPH and lower, the weak EV motor can overcome wind resistance and maintain the speed of the vehicle. Given that this is true, I don't understand why the motor always cycles on around 40 MPH if it can also turn off on the highway. Obviously as well, the engine will always come on for hills, as the Maverick's EV motor will not power it up a hill at highway speeds. (and seems to not be up to the task of solo-tackling hills in general)

But, when I do this, and my trips are a mix of country roads and highways, I regularly get 45-70 MPG trips.

accelerating from stop

You can probably guess by now what I'm going to say. If you can accelerate slowly enough (again, not possible depending on traffic) you won't use your gas engine to accelerate between stops and can eek out incredible MPG. The Maverick also shines in stop and go traffic as the acceleration in those cases is effectively never sudden. This one's easy; when possible, don't have a lead foot.

coming to a stop

Another one which doesn't need much explanation; the Maverick has regenerative braking, so just make as much use of this as you can. There are edge cases when you should accelerate instead of letting the battery charge, such as when trying to get speed so you can coast up a mild hill. But generally, just make the normal usage of the regenerative braking.

A quick practical example

We have a short commute to my kids' school. It's about a 7 minute drive, and one way is uphill. Often, I get about 30 MPG on the way there, and 60 MPG on the way back. Averaging 45 MPG total. The trip there is 1) when the vehicle is first started and 2) mostly uphill, which accounts for the poor mileage on the way there. The way back is the opposite scenario: the engine has heated up and most of our trip is downhill. Most of the hills are also steep enough such that coasting up them is not an option.

There seem to be two major factors which modify my average MPG for this trip, which has ranged from 42 - 55 MPG.

Summary

I hope people find this interesting or useful. I think for the right driver or situation, you could average 55-60 MPG in this little truck. Most people won't be in the situation, but ~40-45 MPG is also not so bad.