Fuel consumption....

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Deleted member 120738

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Just filled up the car and calculated the fuel consumption for our Ibiza FR 1.2 TSI 105PS. Mainly town work, 18 mile round trip to work 3 days a week and shopping at the weekend the fuel consumption is 35.91 mpg - the official urban fuel consumption is 43.5 mpg! Our old Saab 2.2 TiD estate did 37+mpg with the same use. And you can't even fold the back seats down flat in the Ibiza!!!

What do other owners get?
 

camelspyyder

2 SEAT-er
Jun 26, 2014
1,305
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Never drove it in urban conditions but averaged 49 mpg over 3 years of B road commuting (25 miles each way) with that engine.
 

andycupra

status subject to change
are you expecting to hit the official urban mpg? - firstly, 90% of people don't hit the official mpgs guides, they simply don't reflect normal driving,
that aside, your driving (by the sounds of it) is worse than the urban test cycles for mpg your drive to work is only 9 miles each way for example and going to the shops etc will be just about the worst conditions for mpg.
your just over 1mpg down on your saab diesel, so its likely around right.
 

KXL

KXL
Dec 15, 2016
1,581
197
London, UK
If you do this same 18 mile round trip in the middle of the night, with no other cars around, and only stop at the lights, im sure you can get close to your urban official figures. Yes this is unrealistic (no traffic), but dont forget so are the tests on a rolling road with no traffic either.
 

andycupra

status subject to change
I'd have expected the Saab to do better then that tbh.
I've had quite a few over the years and all did over 45 whatever I threw at them.

but be careful to compare apples with apples.
It appears that your driving habits generally provide better mpg than the OP who has described driving patterns that will not give good mpg.
The assertion that you would always get over 45mpg in the saab whereas the OP got 37+ backs up that the OP's driving patterns are less conducive to high MPG.
So its not a surprise that the MPG achieved is not up to the Urban figures.

(it sounds like they are starting to use a different method of creating MPG figures, mostly driven by electric cars, - but this is something that should of happened years ago). - and lets not forget the car manufacturers will push all the rules to provide the best results, for example running the tests with the maximum permissible ambient temperature among other tricks.
 

SilverPilgrim

Active Member
Apr 3, 2019
57
24
UK
I have averaged 42mpg over the last 2000 miles in my Cupra, that is all kinds of driving.

In urban conditions and over short distances it tends to be between 30-35mpg. On the motorway at a steady cruise (65-70mph) it will do 50mpg.

Considering the performance on offer, it is a surprisingly economical engine.
 
Sep 13, 2019
3
1
For being an old engine our 1.4 does not too bad on supermarket unleaded, with redex put through the system every 5k miles. Going to work which involves two long steep hills whilst accelerating up to "motorway speed". I'll get about 35mpg / return leg tends to be 42 (44 with aircon off). Our previous "big car" 1.5T Mini Clubman driven at the same speeds was getting 28 / 37.

On a decent motorway run with 2 of us in the car (i.e. Glasgow to Edinburgh / Dundee) it tends to achieve anything from 46-48..
 
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chriswales6

Active Member
Mar 2, 2016
294
47
Almost 36mpg from a petrol in town isn’t that bad, yes the car is can do more in certain conditions but you need to understand what they are. If you have some spare time it's worth reading official test cycles. But from memory it's something like:

The car is at full operating temperature in an ambient temperature of a hot summer day.
The car is at idle for a number of minutes and when accelerating, it does about as fast as a bus.
The highest speed reached is 30mph but not for very long.

Basically to match the figures you'd have to follow a bus in the summer, don't drive up hills and don't use the aircon.
 

Deleted member 120738

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Myself and SWMBO have just had a fortnight off work and have done a couple of reasonable length trips, 'A' roads and motorway, one 200 mile round trip and one 100 mile round trip. Filled the car up today (am running her on Texaco Supreme 97 octane) and she did 44.34 mpg since last filling up. Much better but I was driving and the car is SWMBO's daily drive and she has a dislike of small boys driving old Corsa's who try to overtake her!
 

Deleted member 120738

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We have both had expensive divorces which is why we are both still working in our early 70's! And we get more state pension not been married!
It is interesting that the members who have replied to my post who get better fuel consumption have cars with larger capacity engines...perhaps 1197cc with a turbocharger is not the best recipe for fuel economy!
 
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RUM4MO

Active Member
Jun 4, 2008
7,784
983
South Scotland
Engine size wise, there is a bit of truth in that, I used to get amazing MPG figures with my MK Escort 1600 Ghia when not hammering it, it had a twin choke Weber carb same engine as MK2 Escort Sport.

Really your main contributor to poor MPG will be the way, time and traffic conditions, my wife's newer version of that engine in a 2015 6C Polo 6MT averaged out over its 4 Years 1 Month and 28.5K miles is just short of 50MPG though most of that use is out of town.
 

Deleted member 120738

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Engine size wise, there is a bit of truth in that, I used to get amazing MPG figures with my MK Escort 1600 Ghia when not hammering it, it had a twin choke Weber carb same engine as MK2 Escort Sport.

Really your main contributor to poor MPG will be the way, time and traffic conditions, my wife's newer version of that engine in a 2015 6C Polo 6MT averaged out over its 4 Years 1 Month and 28.5K miles is just short of 50MPG though most of that use is out of town.

Well, filled the car up yesterday (running it on Texaco Supreme 97 octane) and checked the mpg. It has improved to just over 43mpg on SWMBO;s 18 mile round trip to work and going to the supermarket etc. It has either adjusted to our driving style or possibly the previous owner didn't drive it hard enough or on long enough journeys so it was a bit choked up with soot.....anyway an improvement for the better!
 

RUM4MO

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Jun 4, 2008
7,784
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South Scotland
One comment that I'll make about using higher than needed octane rating petrol is, I have read, and I've also found it to be true, that when using higher RON fuel in an engine than it can advance the ignition to make the most/best of the extra RON fuel, will lead to reduced MPG in general.

I'm backing that up with the period in time that I used 97 petrol in my wife's previous 2002 1.4 16V Polo 9N, that car at that time needed to be run on 97 petrol as it would ping/pink on anything less - that was eventually found to be caused by it burning too much engine oil due to a gummed up/faulty oil cyclonic separator which was having the effect of lowering the RON of the incoming fuel mixture (port injected petrol and air borne oil mist). Yes the low end torque and general driveability improved quite a bit, but the MPG did slightly drop, it was Shell Super Duper stuff I was using.

In general I'm not knocking the use of 97 petrol where it is not needed, just pointing out what the outcome can be, ie reduced MPG and along with the higher price per litre, an overall increase in £/mile.

Nothing wrong with loading up with Shell Super Duper - ie a complete tank fill, to try to improve the cleaning of the engine internals, except the inlet tract area, I try to plan doing that every 6 months but only in the interests of trying to keep the engine slightly cleaner just in case my normal 95 petrol is not loaded up with enough cleaners.

I think that the rational for this drop in MPG on engines that are not able to make best use of that RON of fuel is, the final few RON points are achieved by dumping in a component that does have a lower "energy" capacity than the base petrol (wrong terms being used there, but I'm just trying to provide an idea as to why lower MPG can occur), in the distant past, UK based refineries, I think, used to distill the higher octane fuels "higher up the stack" and so they had a higher specific "energy" capacity than the lower octane ones, but globalisation has meant UK based refinery owners that still did that saying, "sod that, we will just do it the same way as our continental cousins do it and save loads on money" - and so we are were we are right now!

Actually probably only a couple or three non oil companies own and run all the worlds refineries right now, so they care only about money and not what would be best for our cars.

Edit:- sorry, I should have asked, what age and mileage is that car, you do know that DI petrol engines do coke up their inlet tract with hardened/burned on oil deposits, and eventually that will affect the power output and the MPG, the only answer to that is to get the inlet tract, ie the cylinder head inlet valve area shot blasted with walnut shells. Certain usage/running conditions seem to accelerate this build up more than others.
 
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camelspyyder

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Jun 26, 2014
1,305
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I tried Shell V-Max vs Shell 95 in a 1.2 TSI for a few months. It seemed smoother running & the mpg improved about 6% but the cost increased about 8 or 9 % so it wasn't financially viable for me - except to treat the engine once in a while.
 
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Maypack

Ambassador for Cumberland Sausage
Apr 20, 2014
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Gods Country - West Cumbria
I tried Shell V-Max vs Shell 95 in a 1.2 TSI for a few months. It seemed smoother running & the mpg improved about 6% but the cost increased about 8 or 9 % so it wasn't financially viable for me - except to treat the engine once in a while.

Also if you have the Shell Go+ app you will occasionally get 7-8p off a litre of V Power which (in my area at least) brings the price in line with 95RON


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Deleted member 120738

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One comment that I'll make about using higher than needed octane rating petrol is, I have read, and I've also found it to be true, that when using higher RON fuel in an engine than it can advance the ignition to make the most/best of the extra RON fuel, will lead to reduced MPG in general.

I'm backing that up with the period in time that I used 97 petrol in my wife's previous 2002 1.4 16V Polo 9N, that car at that time needed to be run on 97 petrol as it would ping/pink on anything less - that was eventually found to be caused by it burning too much engine oil due to a gummed up/faulty oil cyclonic separator which was having the effect of lowering the RON of the incoming fuel mixture (port injected petrol and air borne oil mist). Yes the low end torque and general driveability improved quite a bit, but the MPG did slightly drop, it was Shell Super Duper stuff I was using.

In general I'm not knocking the use of 97 petrol where it is not needed, just pointing out what the outcome can be, ie reduced MPG and along with the higher price per litre, an overall increase in £/mile.

Nothing wrong with loading up with Shell Super Duper - ie a complete tank fill, to try to improve the cleaning of the engine internals, except the inlet tract area, I try to plan doing that every 6 months but only in the interests of trying to keep the engine slightly cleaner just in case my normal 95 petrol is not loaded up with enough cleaners.

I think that the rational for this drop in MPG on engines that are not able to make best use of that RON of fuel is, the final few RON points are achieved by dumping in a component that does have a lower "energy" capacity than the base petrol (wrong terms being used there, but I'm just trying to provide an idea as to why lower MPG can occur), in the distant past, UK based refineries, I think, used to distill the higher octane fuels "higher up the stack" and so they had a higher specific "energy" capacity than the lower octane ones, but globalisation has meant UK based refinery owners that still did that saying, "sod that, we will just do it the same way as our continental cousins do it and save loads on money" - and so we are were we are right now!

Actually probably only a couple or three non oil companies own and run all the worlds refineries right now, so they care only about money and not what would be best for our cars.

Edit:- sorry, I should have asked, what age and mileage is that car, you do know that DI petrol engines do coke up their inlet tract with hardened/burned on oil deposits, and eventually that will affect the power output and the MPG, the only answer to that is to get the inlet tract, ie the cylinder head inlet valve area shot blasted with walnut shells. Certain usage/running conditions seem to accelerate this build up more than others.

2015MY 1.2 105PS TSi - bought it in June with 22k miles and one lady owner so it has probably not been driven hard before....I am a great believer in a regular Italian tune -up! Anyway much happier with the fuel consumption now. I'm sure the handbook says to run it on 97 RON fuel but it's too cold and wet to go out and check now. I can remember 5 star or 101 Octane petrol being available! One thing I am fanatical about is that I never use supermarket fuel as a cousin who works at Fawley tells me that there are not the additives in it in order to keep the price down. We now have the rattling seat belt buckle on both front seats....what happened to German build quality!
 
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