That is why I like my XLT with 18 inch rims so much. I mean the 20s on the limited are eye candy, love them, but comfort is first. I use 33 psi instead of the 35, the ride comfort is even better and my mpg don't suffer a bit or at least I haven't noticed any loss. I don't know if the 20s will be fine with 33 but you could try. The 2020+ Explorers "require" 33 psi, that should tell you sometthing.
My lease came with 20 and I kept having to buy tires for them due to road hazards where 1 tire would have more tread than the rest. Luckily this last tire was covered though Tire Rack and not much tread was lost between the other 3 that got replaced. I'm at 40 psi and come back down for winter months. Eventually I plan on going 18's but not just yet.
On the highway I get at least 24 mpgs (as much as 27) with my 13 XLT, stock rims, 33 psi. I try to drive at speed limit, not over. If you look at the rpms you shouldn't go past 2k at 6th gear, anything above 2k your mpg will drop exponentially. I also replace spark plugs with OEM ones well before rhe 100k mark, when I bought the truck with 50k miles the sparplugs were toast. I also use 5w-20 full synthetic and I did several drain and refills of the transmission, oem fluid is very important (Moyorcraft LV).
late night trips I am at speed limit but daytime that's impossible. People hyper-mile, have warrants or just get onto a 60 mph freeway doing 39 and stop at the top of the on ramp. Streets they drive 11 under and run the already red light we could have made if they at least did the speed limit. I'll keep an eye on the RPMs in between passing up rolling road blocks; I try to have the instant MPG screen up but people will see you doing "3000" MPH and cut you off to do 42 no blinker. My mpg would understandably go down winter time because I would remote start all the time. At home the snow will be past the wheel wells so there is no put in in snow and punch it, at work I had to buy a shovel because that same amount of snow will fall and ths snow crew will clear the isles and plow us in. From my locker to where i park is 3000 steps, I'm tired and aching not trying to get into a cold vehicle after fighting snow and ice plus that plowed in situation to get out.
I'm about to do my 2nd drain fill and learned short sleeves is not a great idea reaching in between that radiator hose to get the dip stick top off. I was surprised there was a stick this late in car years, they still have them on the new Explorers? I also learned do not put any tops near that opening where the hood latch and horns are, they will be eaten by the front fascia.
I might pull a plug to see what they look like, 2 cars ago my Cruze would consume plugs yearly due to coil packs frying themselves. 70K miles I had to have gone though 18 plugs with 2 sets being tuned. I was hoping this would be like my old Century where you could pop the mounts, put in neutral and ratchet the engine forward to get the back plugs. I guess I'll look for all the gaskets long before the time comes to do them.
Yeah, I can get between 26 - 27 mpg. In the summer time it's normally slightly less due to running the air conditioning. I normally go right at speed limit up to +5 as well.
I also have been doing the transmission drain and refill. I'm glad it has a dipstick and drain plug.
The spark plugs were fouled at 50k? Yikes, I haven't changed mine out and i'm at ~66k. I was hoping to get at least 75k out of them.
I did install a K&N air filter as well (stock air intake). I'm doubtful it will be noticeable in the fuel economy. But I got tired of throwing out air filters. Now I can just clean and re-oil the K&N as needed.
I was always told not to use them because they would coat sensors even if you made the filter faintly pink verses blood red with oil oozing down your arm. Some folks would void warranties for turbo dusting if you had a K&N on. I kinda toyed with the idea once but a few folks said the sensors changed and the 19 would leave a hole you can't fill in the intake. I did accidentally leave the tabs for the air box out and it sounded kinda good. I fixed the tabs back in the next day when I could see where they went in since I changed the filter in the middle of the night. On that no tossing filters route, I've seen they have washable cabin filters too. I usually change mine out 2-3 times a year due to pollen. I also don't have my windows down due to pollen. Between here and NJ when i was stationed there, that yellow coat of pollen would tear me up for those few months. Come winter time I always forget to wear a mask and get severe allergies when I change the filter out.
Also did brakes since the rears were toast and winter traction was crap when the car couldn't control the rears. I had low tread tires, swapped them thinking that was the only issue and found the rears were almost on the backing plate. The wear from what I believe didn't get crazy until I had some kind of hill hold feature put back on. I assumed it was not the hill decent feature but the hold my manual Accord I traded in had that pissed me off. You could feel the car fighting you when you leave the light and when parking in a garage you could hear the rear brakes still holding on audibly.
