[W36 EJO]

Surely 29mpg isn't good in a 1.8T?

For those of you who don't know I have just bought a car and am literally struggling to get 29mpg out of it. If i actually use the turbo as it should be used, I'm looking at 23 - 25mpg.

So, I did a test tonight on a stretch of dual carriageway. Stayed at 50mph in 5th on a flat straight road for about 5 miles. I reset the computer to start with to give a true reading. It started at 51mpg, dropped very quickly to 34 and then dropped every couple of secs down to 29.9 then up to 30.0, back to 29.9 and stayed around there.

Is this right?! Surely it can't be, any ideas what could be wrong? Only bought it on Sat so back to the dealer on sat again to have a complain about it if it don't get better.

The car:

2001 (Y) 1.8T

91,000 miles

Full history

 

[W36 EJO]

Oh yer, and one more thing. My W reg 2.0 with 101,000 on the clock easily got up to 40+mpg on hilly A roads if driven sensibly. I thought my 24mpg on the same roads was because I was having fun hammering it! Found out since that it don't seem so!

 

[spencert]

I average around 30, drops to mid/low 20's if you hammer it, you can get 35+ on a steady motorways cruise though.

 

[sijack252]

Does not sound right that....29mpg[:O]

Give you a comparison..I got a 2001 1.8T ,,but with revo, full milltek, airfilter etc,,and coming back from Derby to Sheffield ,by motorway,36miles, and playing too,,70-100mph,, I got 34mpg.

My girlfriend did the same run but slower behind me in her 2.0Gti like your old car and got 36mpg.

You best checking airfliter and sparkplugs,,if any doubt change them and oil too.

Worth a check of brakes too , especially handbrake ,,make sure nothing is binding,, and also tyre pressures.

You never know, a combination of a couple of those could lead to your poor mpg.

I found going from a 2.0 16v astra,,the golf had poorer mpg[] , even though on paper it suppose to be better.

Hope I been able to help a little [^].

Simon

 

[W36 EJO]

Cheers, will have a look at the air filter tommorow see if theres anything going on. Oil should have just been done as it had a service the friday before I got it. Air filters though they don't always change. Will pop out a sparky too and see the condition of that! This car will cost me a fortune and I'll be driving a car with a turbo like a granny just to try and reach 29mpg!

 

[sijack252]

When i got my car,,it not long had a service ,, but prefer to put new parts in as matter of course.

Have a look on this site for sparkplugs if you need any,,I got the Iridium plugs cheaper than standard.

www.sparkplugs.co.uk

[]

 

[vedhead]

I'm only getting about 30mpg now where as in summer and before I got 35 from a full tank. its the engine mate. cold starts make it over fuel. I'm not booting mine around but if i did i'd be looking at 27ish id say, in this cold, about 32 in normal weather

are you doing lots of cold start driving?

 

[Mikedav]

32MPG tops is all you get out of a 1.8T? I had no idea. Thats much closer to a V6 than I realised

 

[aberdeengti]

i drive to work and back and thats pretty much it, if i stay in 5th and coast when i can (whenever theres a slight hill) i get about 30-32mpg on a tank. When i drove to york earlier this month and back i got 36/37mpg, if i drive normally, (fast/slow) then i get about 29mpg roughly. Only had the car a couple of months so not really sure about summer.

 

[BeezerDiesel]

My last car a 1.8T 180bhp model averaged about 28mpg and that wasn't driving hard by any means (mostly 80-85mph motorway cruising), didn't change the economy by much by having it chipped though. By contrast my 130TDI seems to do about 45-48mpg which is also lower than many people quote. This is going by actually calculating mpg on brim to brim re-fuelling too, not going by the trip computer.

Perhaps we just get crap petrol in Exeter!

I've also had two Golf VR6s which did similar mpg figures to the 1.8T!!! And quite a few mk2 Golf GTIs which averaged over 30 and over 40 on a decent slowish run.

 

[Chris]

Rubbish... i could get 40mpg taking it easy no probs in my GTI. Sitting at 50 for that long you should probably get in excess of that really. Only around town i find it drops into the mid to late 20's.

The 180 1.8T seems totally different tho.... im struggling to get above 25mpg!!

 

[stokeballoon]

Sat on the D/c at 55-60, because of the traffic, my 1.8T gets 40-41 easily, chipped, Milltek, etc

This is backed up with an average over the last year on the MFA of 32.9, and I always see 340-360 before the light is on.

Dave

 

[spencert]

The MFA isn't that accurate though, it's easily out by a few mpg - too optimisitic

 

[Chris]

Well okay, but we're all going off the same method for reading out our mpg's...

 

[PJ]

My figures are around the 30mpg average. Chris, I'm amazed you can get 40 as an average. I could probably get that but I'd have to drive like a granny doing a tortoise impression.

 

[Chris]

No no, i didn't ever achieve 40 as an average... it would drive me up the wall driving like that all day! I was just making the comment that driven sensibly on say a B-road, you'll quite easily touch high 30's and 40's from experience. It's not fun... thats why i dont look at the mpg anymore.. whats the point! []

 

[v6rkc]

I actually had 47.9 mpg a couple of weekends ago although i was stuck behind and truck for about 10 miles!!

 

[Mikedav]

I had 199MPG average the other day. But then I had reset it at 80MPH on a hill and I was coasting. Point being as has been said, the MPG MFA isn't particuarly accurate and TBH I have not looked at mine for months...its on average speed!

Surely the day to day MPG is what matters, and not what your 'top achievement' is, as thats how the car is used day to day? If thats the case I get roughly 26MPG, which means a 1.8T averaging 29-32MPG isn't that much more economical really. Quite suprising

 

[KEITH 20VT]

29mpg sounds bang on to me. My MFA reads an average of 29.1 and when booting it I get 25 as opposed to steady driving at 35, so on average 29 is about right.

 

[W36 EJO]

Thanks for all the replies folks. I'm just a bit stunned really as I always read around and found that on paper, the 2.0GTI does 34mpg (combined average) and the 1.8T states 36mpg combined. On my 2.0 the average on the 2nd trip computer always stated around 35mpg over a couple of thousand miles. Ok, I have only done 250 miles since I had this one, but it's average is 24.5!

One of the reasons I went for the 1.8T and not a V5 was because of the fuel economy, but it aint done me any favours!