Hi, I'm new to the forums and wanted some advice.

 

We're moving house soon and will be doubling our commute to work (the wife and I) and this will mean we spend around £700 a month in fuel!

 

We are therefore looking to get a car that has good MPG figures as if we could average 70 MPG for example it would save around £200 a month.  We can only afford one new (or nearly new) car at the moment so would share it, whoever does most miles in that day would take the new car.

 

I've got a shortlist of a few cars and have test driven the Fabia today and was impressed, it was the 1.6 TDi version with the 90 PS engine, an SE.

 

According to the on board computer I average 85 MPG over the 20 mile test, mainly dual carriageway, undulating, with some town driving.  However, I know these computers are not very accurate and a 20 mile test isn't really much of a clue to what can be achieved if you actually own the car.  The salesman also told me that the Greenline version wouldn't be any better in terms of MPG for the type of driving I do, ie mainly motorway and it was more suited to town driving.

 

So, question is what type of Fabia do you own and what MPG are you getting?  Is this figure from the on board computer or is it calculated by the old fashioned method?  Which Fabia would be best for MPG and my driving, as I say, 80% motorway.  I tend to stick to around 60 MPH to save fuel as spending as much as I do on it even a 10% saving is well worth the extra 2 or 3 minutes it takes to get to my destination.

 

Any advice is welcome, the other cars I am considering are the Kia Rio, Hyundai i20 (achieved 77 MPG in the same test as for the Fabia) the Suzuki Swift and possibly the Audi A2 if I decide to go for something older.  The Fabia is favourite at the moment but I want to make as informed a decision as I can, so thanks for any input.

 

Plan getting the car in Oct/Nov.

 

Thanks, sorry for the long first post!

daughter has a monte 105PS 1.6tdi, and averages only 50-55 mpg on a daily 20 mile each way run

 

I have a fabia GLII 1.2tdi with stop start etc and average tank on tank 60-65mpg, I have had 89mpg on one long run and see 70+ on many runs

 

wifes citigo elegance 75ps beats my GLII by about 5mpg on same runs and still only got 600 miles on clock

 

biggest killers for mpg on 1.6tdi is regen and cold starts+

 

if the fabia you took out was already up to temp you will have got a false idea of economy from cold

I have a Fabia davidjwest and it's a great car but mine is not a diesel, sorry. I drove a Fiat on holiday with the Fiat diesel Suzuki use and wasn't very impressed. The Greentech has a smaller engine which can be counter productive if you have to thrash it but I think it has cruise control as standard (good for economy and convenient for long journeys) and at 60mph would surely be fine!

I have the 1.2 Tsi DSG and easily get between 50-55 mpg (computer) on a steady motorway run. I absolutely love my Fabia (this is my 3rd) and would strongly recommend it out of those you mention. However if I was doing your motorway mileage i would definitely go diesel.

 

The i20 is a nice car but not as good as the Fabia on motorway trips IMO. The Kia Rio, regardless of the motoring press reviews is not as reliable and the A2, whilst a great motor in it's day is just too dated and of course long since discontinued with silly prices being asked for a good diesel.

 

The only one that comes close for me is the Swift but it depends how old you are and whether you are looking at practicality or funky. Fabia wins for me.

davidjwest - Honest John real life fuel economy register indicates: Swift DDiS 61.4mpg; Rio 1.1 CRDi 57.5mpg; Fabia Greenline II 63.6mpg; Fabia 1.6 TDI 90 56.6mpg; Citigo Greentech 58.8mpg (petrol). Citigo se is available from £69 pounds a month on pcp and has cheaper insurance. Just a thought!

I own a 1.4 pd tdi fabia... Around town it will do 49-51 mpg easily (milton Keynes-lots of stop start). This model does not have a dpf so no regens, and no stop/start function wasting fuel.

On my commute it will do 62mpg on dual carriageway runs (when considering traffic delays and the 3mpg or so which the trip computer over estimates. I however do not drive at 60mph of which would see a return of 70mpg. The 62mpg return is driving at 80mph of which all motorway users do! Or is it 77mph?!

I however will be honest and state the 3pot engine in the 1.4 isnt what id be happy to have over a commute of more than 50 miles or so. It has enough power but if your going to be pounding the miles your better off with something larger/more comfortable.

I bought a Fabia SE 1.6tdi (105) for motorway driving.

Test drove a Greenline and thought it was too loud and low-powered to tolerate for hours at a time, but people do seem to get better economy from them, even with motorway driving.

Some helpful replies here:

http://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/273161-most-economical-diesel-for-higher-motorway-speeds/

In my 1.6tdi, now that I've done 4000 miles, am getting about 60mpg over a tank in the summer with about a 70:30 motorway:town split. I generally take care to drive economically and keep at or just below 70mph on the motorway.

Without taking the trip computer figures too literally, mpg does seem to really suffer with:

- traffic (stop-start, gear changes)

- journeys shorter than 30 mins

- speed above 70mph

Individual cars, driving styles, and the local landscape seem to cause lots of variation, but from what I've learned about my car so far I think that by doing nothing but steady long journeys at below 65 mph the figure would be significantly better than 60mpg.

Hope this helps!

A

Edited 17 September, 201312 yr by Another Newbie

I have a 1.6 tdi cr (75bhp). I commute two 12 mile trips on hilly B roads each day. Mixed with town driving (75% commute- 25% town) I get 53mpg.

 

On a recent 310 mile motorway at 70mph on a warm day I got 63mpg. It seems to prefer hot weather and long trips.

Edited 18 September, 201312 yr by bobjob49

I drive 74 miles to and from work 3 day's a week (148 mile round trip) and my Greenline II chugs along quite nicely at 70 mph (on GPS) thanks to the Cruise Control.

 

As you can see from my Sig (Fuelly) I'm returning about 61.1 mpg, which is a world better than the 42 mpg I used to get on my old Civic 1.4 Vision, and I don't notice any performance difference between a 1.4 Petrol and the 1.2 TDi in the Fabia!..

 

Okay it's loud on Tick-Over and when chugging around town, but on the Motorway its not noticeable! and the Speed Sensitive volume on the Swing Radio with the MDI/USB interface means I can't hear it at all!!

£700 pm?  You must be doing 50K miles pa plus then.    Suggest variable servicing ie 20K between services is important as it is for me.

 

What nearly everyone seems to forget is that during the warm up period you will only get about half the expected MPG that is published, for the remainder of the journey a good driver you drives with far-sighted predictive driver who rarely touches the brakescan get near the urban, extra, combined figures.  When Manufacturers do the test the car is up to temperature before they begin the test and the ambient temperature is usually optimum ie STP, Std Temp and Pressures.

 

So when working out what to expect you need to know how far/long is the warm up zone.  Our HTP warms up incredibly quickly ie less than a mile, the Fabia VRS, small engine, small thermal capacity warms up in around 3 miles (oil/water up to 90c) Octavia VRS more like 4 or so miles average.  Diesels can take similar distance for the small engines but even longer for the 4 cylinder diesels I have had.

 

This empirical method seems to work out quite accurate and if the main journeys are less than 20 miles the warm zone drastically effects all cars except cars like the HTPs ie small naturally aspirated engine.  Manufacturers know cars sell on the published MPG but few highlight the relevance of warm up time and effect.

 

My Skoda dealer reckoned average drivers would achieve 10% less than published which sounds reasonable to me.  The Octy 3 figures look very good showing what can be achieved by less weight, aerodynamic design and other fuel saving technologies.  Cylinder deactivation and more hybrid will improve this hugely again.  Horses for courses.       

David, welcome to the site. It's a good place to get real world advice about Skoda's. 

 

I've had both diesel and petrol (currently on a petrol engine). The brand is very good, much more reliable and more solid than the other cars you mention according to real world testing and surveys by the mags and JD Power etc. So that's not just my bias towards Skoda talking! Totally agree with Horkin's assessment of them. 

 

Overall, the fuel trip computers are reliable and fairly accurate most find. My own trip computers were and are spot on when compared to my pencil and paper method with no worthwhile notable difference between the two methods of calculation.

 

Anyhoo...getting advice about real world mpg's is like asking 'how long is a piece of string'?  We are all so different in the way we use our cars, the way we drive them (and driving style is one of THE most important factors as I'm sure you know, but more about that in a moment!), the traffic conditions we encounter, and as has been mentioned, the topography we drive them in. Having said that, the 1.6cr is a fantastic engine and really suited to longer motorway trips. My lil sis has one and on mixed motoring in urban and motorway use achieves between 56-62mpg. On her Birmingham trip she achieves 68mpg overall which is over a distance of 350 miles in total mostly all on the motorways and dual carriageways. It rarely varies other than in winter it drops by around 5-8% due to winter diesel and the colder temps which diesels don't like. 

 

At this point it is worth pointing out that the cr 1.6 (like many other manufacturers diesel engines) had some bad press when it first came on the market regarding it's fuel economy. It was really one of the first of the new breed diesel engines with a much shorter stroke engine than previously. The reason for this was to reduce piston speed and further enhance the diesel engine lifespan and make emissions lower, improving fuel economy. This engine is coupled with a long ratio (high geared) gearbox, again to enhance fuel economy. However, many on this board complained bitterly that it just would not achieve anywhere near it's actual EC fuel consumption figures. This is not an uncommon view and applies to all cars and manufacturers but the cr1.6 is a bit special and it's worth noting the following...

 

Because so many people on this board were complaining about the fuel economy, I decided to take an actual look at some of the cars and to start conducting a survey of the way they were being used and the driven. I wanted to find an answer to the problem. There were 13 cars in the study not all Skoda, some VW were include as many on the VW site complained in the same way. It proved interesting. I should just add that I was working as a diesel engine design and development engineer at the time and so I had my own motives for doing this. It proved to be an eye opener from several points of view. I examined the cars superficially in most cases for obvious faults and two of the car were put on the dyno for further analysis revealing a faulty ecu on one of them (a Golf). However, no faults were found on any other cars, just as the dealers had said when owner had taken them in for inspection to make sure all was well. Yet mpg's varied wildly and indeed some mpg's were very poor indeed. The next stage was to drive some of the cars myself and then witness the owners driving them. When I drove the cars I achieved good to reasonable fuel economy in all cases. However, after witnessing the owners driving their cars, the causes of the problem were immediately apparent. It was apparent that all the owners were driving the cars in an unsuitable manner. They were failing to adapt to the newer type of engine and high gearing of the CR engine. They were treating the engines just like they did when they had older long stroke diesel engines. Those engines could be driven at very low rpm's and still give good fuel economy. However, the cr engine likes to rev more as it is a shorter stroke engine. To be efficient it has to rev more than a longer stroke engine. Not suggesting it has to rev wildly of course, just not slogged around at very low rpm. Some of the owners were slogging the engine along at 1000rpm in 5 gear for ages. It hated it and was shuddering. Fuel economy was going through the roof as the engine struggled to survive! It was like driving up hill in too higher gear all the time, that's how bad it was. Because of this, the engines regened an unusually frequent amount of times and wasted fuel. Not good for the engine at all.

 

After some demo driving and instruction at the wheel, everyone without exception changed their driving style. Unsurprisingly, everyone reported a huge improvement in fuel economy afterwards. Further, as the engines continued to bed in and loosen the fuel economy kept improving. After following the owners for some 15 months everyone is completely happy, even those living in hilly area's. 

 

Moral of the story is to learn to drive the car, experiment with technique. Avoid using 5th gear below 55-60mph as the engine is revving too low if you do. Find the engine sweet spots for cruising (best rpm's for mpg and speed). Understand the engine sweet spots will change as the engine beds in and covers more miles. So continue to experiment often. My own sister was using 5th gear all the time and it killed the economy on back road. So now she uses 4th gear and gets another 6 mpg, only using 5th gear above 60mph.  Remember, 5 gear is an overdrive not a gear you must use all the time. Hope this lengthy post helps...good luck and let us all know what you get.

Edited 18 September, 201312 yr by Estate Man

£700 pm is near 108 Gallons @ £6.50.  

& if 40 mpg, that is 4300 miles a month between 2 people.

51,600 miles pa

 

4300 miles a month @ 60 mpg is 71 gallons & @ £6.50 = £461.50 a month.

 

So no need to get 70 mpg to save over £200 if already getting 40mpg

 

4300 miles per month @ 70 mpg @ £6.60 a gallon is 61.5 gallons = £406 pm

992 a week & £94.

 

PS

So £5000-£6000 a year fuel,

3 services a year, best check how much those are going to cost.

VED, £0 - £120 a year. How much for which ever car.

Insurance, is there much difference from different cars.

 

george

Another contender could be the Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 cdti if you haven't already considered it. I don't like them personally but they are economical.

Another contender could be the Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 cdti if you haven't already considered it. I don't like them personally but they are economical.

 

I had one for 18 months - its the worst car I've ever owned and I deeply regret buying it! The worst (of many) aspect was the low speed characteristic of the engine - around 1300 rpm it used to intermittently stutter terribly and often stall - in a violent way - as if the timing was completely wrong and the engine had attempted to reverse itself. Occasionally it would do this when trying to start - the noise was terrible - I'm sure the engine spun back and the camchain complained. Dealers were unable to help - its fine they said - then when it did one of its fits and stalled in the middle of a roundabout and I got rear ended I'd had enough.

 

It also used to bounce up and down incessantly like it was on a trampoline. Used to get 52mpg at best even though the computer said 62mpg.

 

It was the most expensive to own car I've ever had.

Edited 18 September, 201312 yr by xman

I have a 3 month old Monte Carlo Tech 1.6TDI and have now covered nearly 5k miles. I have previously had just about every other VAG TDI engine in a wide range of VWs,Audis,SEATs & Skodas, to include 1.9s both PD and nonPD(90,110,115&130 bhp),2.0s in 140/170 configurations and now the 1.6(oh I forgot a 1.4TDI Polo).

I consider myself fairly experienced in driving TDIs and cover approx 20k pa. My feelings toward the 1.6 is that it can be very economical when driven gently ie with economy in mind but if not driven this way it seems that the fuel economy suffers disproportionately when compared to the earlier 1.9s in particular.

With extreme care I am averaging 65/66 mpg and I have an 'ideal' commute consisting of 2miles of country lanes ,19 miles of motorway (@60/65 mph) and a final 2 miles of dual carriageway I rarely encounter much traffic due to the time of my journeys. On the few occasions that I have either been in a hurry or encountered heavy traffic my average can easily drop to low 50s.

As a comparison I had a SEAT Toledo 1.9 TDI 110bhp and whilst that wasn't ultimately as economical as the current car, averaging about 60mpg if I was pressing on it only dropped to 55/56mpg.

Finally(with apologies for my ramblings) the 1.6 appears to be more temperature/ weather dependant than the earlier engines.

In summary I can achieve very good consumption with my current car I feel as though I have to work much harder than with most of the earlier cars. It's taken away some of the driving enjoyment

Dave

I had one for 18 months - its the worst car I've ever owned and I deeply regret buying it! The worst (of many) aspect was the low speed characteristic of the engine - around 1300 rpm it used to intermittently stutter terribly and often stall - in a violent way - as if the timing was completely wrong and the engine had attempted to reverse itself. Occasionally it would do this when trying to start - the noise was terrible - I'm sure the engine spun back and the camchain complained. Dealers were unable to help - its fine they said - then when it did one of its fits and stalled in the middle of a roundabout and I got rear ended I'd had enough.

 

It also used to bounce up and down incessantly like it was on a trampoline. Used to get 52mpg at best even though the computer said 62mpg.

 

It was the most expensive to own car I've ever had.

I knew there was a reason I didn't like them (I can actually think of many). I thought of it as my brother has one and is always raving about his mpg, he's not much of a car guy though so wouldn't really notice if it was awful. He got it new with the unlimited* warranty though. *Not actually unlimited but hey it makes the advert look great!

Well put Sir above in post 15.

 

Just had a 1.6 TDI Fabia as a loan car.  Compared to the 1.9 TDI had in the Fabia VRS, excellent Mk 1 Octy L&K, mid fifties to mid sixties tanking it or cruising, excellent engine ie 130 hp PD.  On the 1.6 TDI loan car looked at the MDI and it was showing 45 MPG, I can get that of the Fabia 2 VRS on a good day.  Thought I would see how well I could do on the return journey to the Dealer, sort of an Extra Urban cycle and managed 70 mpg.  Not pleasant to drive this car to aim to get 70 mpg, really sucks any pleasure out of driving it.

 

The Fabia is quite un-aerodynamic and not good fuel consumption and full motorway speeds which every model it is.

 

If you are doing loads of miles ie 5k a month-ish, either a 1.9D Octy 1,2 or the new Octy 3 with any of the diesels other than the VRS are much more competent high mileage munchers, make sure on variable of course.   

Finally(with apologies for my ramblings) the 1.6 appears to be more temperature/ weather dependant than the earlier engines.

Dave

 

Dave...look at my posts! you think YOU ramble!!...      

I have some sympathy for xmans experience too. The 1300 Fiat engine in the Corsa's had a habit of breaking the cambelt in those earlier versions too. Bit off putting.

Great, thanks for the info guys!

 

If you don't mind another question, how accurate do you think the on board MPG figure is compared to real life?

 

I've heard people say it's around 3% too high. others it's up to 20%, or does it vary from car to car?

Hi David

 

Good luck with your purchase. I have a 1.6 diesel. It is the 105 hp engine. The car is now 3 years old and has done 24,000 miles.

 

The onboard computer reading is pretty accurate. However, it can be a bit misleading if you watch it only on longer journey as the initial fuel consumption setting of with a cold engine may only average 30mpg for the first mile or so. A tank of fuel usually delivers around 50mpg refill to refill.

 

Another thing with my car is that fuel consumption depends on the outside temperature. That's for the same journey, with the same person driving. On a hot day (28 - 30) it can do better than 60 mpg but in winter with the weather around freezing it will only be 45. That's for a journey of 20 miles.

 

Some people report that their cars do 60 mpg on long motorway trips. My car doing 70 struggles to deliver more than 55mpg even on a hot day.

 

Clearly, using the air conditioning or driving with the lights, heater fan and wipers on reduces the mpg.

 

I've tried driving using high revs and low revs. My car does best using the throttle very gently in the highest gear possible keeping the revs around 1500 rpm. The engine doesn't like this and will stutter and jerk when idiling at a junction or traffic lights following a few miles of this type of driving.

 

The good news is that the car goes like a scalded cat when driven enthusuatically. This can reduce the mpg by 10 (e.g. from 55 to 45).

 

Overall I am disappointed with the fuel consumption as the test figures are something like 73 for country driving and a combined figure of 64. Living in rural Norfolk I had assumed I would get an average of around 65mpg. It's never got close.

It is extremely difficult to say how accurate the OBC readings are in any car. The only thing you can be sure of is that they are not exactly accurate but can be used as a guide. I always feel no two cars are the same in this respect and once tyres are changed or services missed the readings are even more unreliable.

 

As for the constant reminders of how the Fabia box shape is not aero dynamic, this applies to most superminis where practicality has been the criteria for the manufacturers. You will find a few, like the Fiesta which strives for aerodynamic styling but it sacrifices  the practicality by doing so.

Following my earlier post, as well as a temperature sensitivity I have also noticed that prolonged use of a/c seems to hit the economy harder than with all of my earlier cars. So much so that I would actively turn off the a/c at the earliest opportunity. This is not something I have done before.

I hope that my posts are not seen as being too negative as overall I am extremely pleased with this car. The common rail engine is certainly more refined albeit with what sometimes feels like the characteristics of a petrol than an old school diesel. This may well have a lot to do with the short stroke design.

I have recently purchased the 1.6 TDI Monte and have only covered 800 miles so far, my first tank returned me 53mpg combined (real figures) (OBC stated 49mpg) and that's obviously taking it easy as its new but I'm hoping it will improve, I don't ever think it it will return the 67mpg that they report which leaves me 14mpg short at the moment :-(, I have learned something new today from Estate Man's post (Thanks) regarding the short stroke engine and will be implementing the driving style changes asap.

One source of info.  

 

http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/sector/SM 

 

Average % of exaggeration is 15% in the Super mini section.

 

Are the % difference between manufactures figures and what punter get growing.