Americans surveyed had a generally dim view of U.S. automakers' efforts. Viewed most favorably for their hybrid plans were Toyota, with 41 percent of respondents, and Honda, with 40 percent.

Ford's hybrid efforts got the nod of only 14 percent, GM's only 13 percent and Chrysler was last at 8 percent.

Sales of the Toyota Prius hybrid grew 90 percent in September.

But are hybrids really as superior in fuel efficiency as automakers claim in their multimillion dollar advertisements? Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, has thrown a half-bucket of cold water on that nouveau conventional wisdom. In an October cover article the magazine reveals how their own fuel economy test results compare to the "EPA estimates" behind the mileage claims of every automaker selling cars in the USA.

Highlights of our study:

• Shortfalls in mpg occurred in 90 percent of vehicles we tested and included most makes and models.

• The largest discrepancy between claimed and actual mpg involved city driving. Some models we tested fell short of claimed city mpg by 35 to 50 percent.

• Hybrids, whose selling point is fuel thriftiness, had some of the biggest disparities, with fuel economy averaging 19 mpg below the EPA city rating.

Everyone who's ever computed his own gas mileage knows the EPA figures are unrealistically high, even after they were arbitrarily "adjusted" with a 10 percent reduction in 1984. But the government mandated test regimen for measuring fuel economy is still the same dinosaur it was when originally cobbled together in 1975. So how does it deal with these newfangled "hybrid" cars? They start their testing with a fully charged battery! If the test is long enough this advantage will be minimized, but the test protocol runs for only 31 minutes in the "city" test and 12.5 minutes for "highway." Consumer Reports, on the other hand, starts their hybrid tests "with the battery at the charge level you normally find--about half." Their "city" test is not as long at 16 minutes, but "highway" is longer at 37 minutes. Larger "real-world" discrepancies exist too, like the EPA test's professional driver following a prescribed speed and acceleration curve on a dyno vs. CU's two test drivers making 6 test runs on real roads, and EPA's variable "highway" speed of 30 to 60 mph, averaging 48 vs. CU's constant 65 mph.

So what's the result? Here are the tallies for select cars from Honda and Toyota:

From the chart we can see that, if you believe Consumer Reports' "real world" tests, hybrid cars 'city' fuel economy is often no better than good old fashioned gas only cars from the same maker. And no expensive, complicated, heavy, limited lifetime battery/motor system is required to achieve it. Just lightweight, aerodynamic and underpowered - the classic japanese car formula.

If you really want the best gas mileage try driving slower. I typically get 26 mpg while commuting in my 6 cylinder Audi "upscale car," mostly on an interstate highway. One day I tried driving at the speed limit on every street in my route and the on-board computer reported: 30 mpg.

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