I put about 1000 miles on my CRD this weekend on a trip from Indiana to East Tennessee. On the trip down I got 27.7 mpg driving 70-ish, and 27.9 mpg on the way back driving 65-ish. While in Tennessee the mileage was 21.9 mpg for a combination of city driving in Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge and country driving around the Smoky Mountain Nation Park. All mileages were calculated. The Jeep had 1630 miles on it when we started the trip.

Part of the drive around the park included the motorcycle mecca 'Tail of the Dragon', with 318 curves in 11 miles. The low end torque of the CRD was awesome through the twists and turns and the Jeep itself handled better than I thought it would. I don't think I ever used more than a third of the throttle...the CRD would just pull and pull. The ABS/EPS/TT never kicked in. The only casualty of the Dragon was my girlfriend's stomach.

We had a cabin on a mountain side and the road to it was steep. I'm guessing 35 degrees inclination but it felt like 80. It was one-lane paved road about a quarter mile long with a couple 90 degree turns then a 180 degree turn before pulling into our cabin's driveway...uphill all the way. Once again, the short wheelbase CRD was the perfect vehicle. I'm glad I didn't ride my motorcycle!

The only time I had any problems with the Jeep was going up the cabin road with about 1/3 tank of fuel. I was most of the way up when it started missing and losing power. I guess the fuel pickup became uncovered. Once I got to the cabin and level ground it started running normally and never sputtered again, but for a moment I was concerned.

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My Jeep Liberty page

ORM, air filter mod, and less restrictive exhaust has increased my 'everyday' driving 3 mpg.