consumption: temperate vs tropics

let's do some comparison guys,

since i'm in Malaysia with 30+ degC all year round, my climate control is switched on practically all the time @ 20 - 23 degC. Of course, this impacts on my consumption. I can get about 12 km per litre cruising @120 km/h (that's about 33mpg, right?). However, the engine is a different beast if and when driven mostly in town (read crawling) traffic, where coupled with mid30 degC midday temps, will yield consumption figures as low as 5-7km per litre (from my rough estimates - pls correct me if I'm wrong). Again, the climate control is on all the time.

for your info, mine is the 2litre 16 valve version.

would be interesting to do some kind of "benchmarking" against a UK consumption figure.

cheers now

Hi,

In the UK I get about 30mpg on a longer run on the motorway, in town this drops to about 23-24mpg. Obviously it is colder here which means more fuel is used during warm up. The climate control is on auto so it also running the compressor sometimes.

Mine is an automatic though so it should use more fuel.

Poggy

Hi,

they sound pretty much the same then, 30+ mpg long distance and low to mid 20s around town.

just out of curiosity, what kind of (ground!) speed do you keep for example on the A1? 100mph (~160km/h)? Do you reckon the cruise control function improves consumption in any way or would you rather not use the cruise function?

I have not really pusher the ulysse for top speed tho i have hit 160km/h on a few occassions. it remained stable and calm i must say.

btw, mine is the auto tiptronic version...

thanks 4 ur reply

rgds

Hi,

I normally stick to around 70-75mph on the motorway. We have so many speed cameras here that my licence wouldn't last long.

I think if you push the speed up the fuel consumption would probably increase a lot. I do use cruise control which works well.

Poggy

Hi,

Just come back from a long trip up to North Yorks - about 185 miles from home!

Temp normally set on auto between 20 and 22 - Last night running the car between 75 and 90 [few speed cameras up that end of the country on the roads I was using]. MPG seemed to average at about 34, although when I pulled back to 70 this went way up. I know I could have got a lot better. It is pushing it to 90 that seems to kill it! But wanted to get home...

Stuart

you're right guys,

we have speed cams here too and i've had it with the speed fines (FYI since 2000 i've accumulated ~2000 Malaysian ringgits in fine, that's abt 300 pounds of your currency. quite a healthy amt by our stds! ---then again it was the period when i was with my audi A4...)

so now, with the ulysse, we (i and my family) really enjoy the super comfort of the car that i drive at more sensible speeds (plus the fact i'm tired of hvg to settle the fines by now!)

i still haven't achieved better than 33mpg so for my next long distance trip, i'm determined to keep to 110km/hr max and see what happens...

happy motoring guys.

I have my AC set to 20 ish most of the time

I travel about quite a bit in my 2.2JTD back and forth to london, and have managed (once) to get 40mpg on a 100 mile trip. This was unusual as it was slow traffic all the way (actually that's not unusual) so I was probably doing 50 most of the time.
On a normal day I get about 34 at cruising speed of 80mph on the motorway.
If I thrash it at 90mph I get about 28.
If I'm fully loaded with the family at family speed I get about 32.
I dont do much town driving so cant comment here.

I do find that the cruise control makes it less economical.
And obviously using the AC on full blast and even having headlights will have a detrimental effect on MPG as it puts extra load on the engine.

Froggy

I'm seeing around the same figures as Froggy on my 2.0JTD.

I have a 2.2 JTD and from a full tank I managed 455 miles before tanking up. After filling up to the top again my calculation came out as 28.1 MPG. I found this a bit dissapointing but this figure may be masked by the following.

I have done numerous short stop start journeys, also 3 or 4 journey's of about 7 miles which took longer then 1 hour to complete, stationery traffic. (I live in North London and what with Christmas shopping etc.) This is probably the main reason for my low MPG.

I am also new to driving a diesel I don't know whether this has been a factor.

Car also very new only 540 on the clock, might settle down and improve after 1,000 to 1,500 miles?

I will post once I tank up again.

Lou

Hi,

I think the key to driving a diesel, especially if you are new to them and always driven big engine petrol cars, is not to put your foot to the floor. Most of the torque is at the lower range i.e. use the turbo but also short shift.

As another matter to bring up, I always use Shell Diesel [I also only use Shell Optimax in my Mondeo]. This is because this fuel, along with Texaco I think], is the best around [according to the Telegraph Motoring Expert]. Not only does it keep the engine clean, it should give more ecomony. Be interesting to see what everyone else uses, and if this is the case.

Stuart

I tend to use BP (because the company pay for it and I get my Nectar points). Not noticed a problem with it, but have nothing to compare it against either.

Lou, my 2.2jtd improved it's economy by 3-4mpg after several thousand miles when the engine loosened up, now getting 34-35mpg on a mixture of motorway and town driving.

Keggers

Hi,

I have done 1600 miles now and get 29mpg on combined town/motorway trips. It is a 2.0 petrol auto, so not bad I think. THe roof bars probably make the consumption worse, so say by about 10%. Not sure how true this is, but it can only really affect the motorway I would have thought.

Anyway they make it look like the "A-Team" van.

Poggy

Ha ha - if only it came in black with a big red stripe on it! And mountings on the sliding doors and [detachable] tow bar for a machine gun that never actually kills anyone!!!

Stuart

Second tank has resulted in almost the same figure as the first tank of 28.22 MPG though an extra click on the pump when it is full could make 1/2 mile to the gallon difference I may be closer to 29 MPG. I still find this low. I will now take my roof bars off, also I have only done 1,000 miles so hopefully it will improve once the engine loosens up a bit more.

Lou