On 31/07/2023 at 01:05, SouthernComfort said:

Again, no opportunity to comment on the 1.5tsi in our market, but FWIW, having covered less than 2000km from new in my 1.4tsi 8 speed auto I have no complaints about fuel economy. Short distance suburban running returns around 7l/100km (40.5 mpg). Average highway/freeway driving averages 4.8l/100km (58.8mpg) although I have experienced as low as 4.5l/100km (62.7 mpg) depending on distance and constancy of speed etc. The 8sp is smooth with plenty of torque and compares favourably in every way with the Golf mk7 1.4tsi 7sp DSG that I had a few years back. Personally speaking, I don't see the benefit of 1.8 or 2.0 engines given the performance this 1.4 puts out. 

 

Having lately been used to a V6 CRD Jeep Grand Cherokee 4x4 (frequently pulling an off-road caravan), I don't even think about the Skoda's consumption day to day, it's pure joy!

 

In Australia, petrol is 87p/litre. In the UK, it's £1.44/litre.

 

Edited 1 August, 20232 yr by Carlston

1 hour ago, Carlston said:

 

In Australia, petrol is 87p/litre. In the UK, it's £1.44/litre.

 

Not an accurate comparison unfortunately, even though fuel here is still a bit cheaper than in the UK. In my area 95RON is around $2.20 p/l, equivalent to GBP1.15.  I wish it was 87p!

 

My point was to attest to the relative economy of the 1.4tsi alongside the 1.5tsi, purely for interest's sake. Even more significant in my case is comparing the fuel bills for my previous 4x4 against those for the Skoda.  

2 hours ago, SouthernComfort said:

Not an accurate comparison unfortunately, even though fuel here is still a bit cheaper than in the UK. In my area 95RON is around $2.20 p/l, equivalent to GBP1.15.  I wish it was 87p!

 

It's an average figure for Australia.

 

Global petrol prices

https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/Australia/gasoline_prices/

?

If 87 pence is an average how much is the lowest priced 95 octane petrol in Australia?

57 minutes ago, Carlston said:

 

It's an average figure for Australia.

 

Global petrol prices

https://www.globalpetrolprices.com/Australia/gasoline_prices/

The data in the site you're referencing is seriously behind the times. It's been a very long time since 95RON has been as low as $1.67 p/l anywhere. Even base RON91 is around $1.90, RON95 $2.20, dearer still for 98. These are Melbourne prices, but fairly similar across the state capitals and generally more expensive the more remote you get.

59 minutes ago, toot said:

?

If 87 pence is an average how much is the lowest priced 95 octane petrol in Australia?

87p ($1.67) 'average' is just nonsense for 95RON. Even base 91RON is around $1.90 on a good day.

On 31/07/2023 at 15:59, Felix2021 said:

That is only available in 130HP version. 150HP is using standard turbo.

I believe 150HP version will get variable turbo in EVO2 version, which starts being marketed now, but not available in O4. Will probably be after facelift.

I THINK, that all 190HP versions are Budack cycle now.

Yes, it's more efficient than "normal" 2.0, but greatly depends on driving style.

Friend of mine has A4 with this engine. Driving around Finland (huge fines for overspeeding) he's getting avarage consumption of 5,5 l/100km. Impressive result, but mostly due to driving style.

No.

As noted already by someone, it's more about gear ratios than engine as such.

1.5 is much more efficient than 1.8, and suitable for most users i would say. I very rarely use all it's power.

When you think about gearbox however, you are right. Seems that they have overdone it with ratios. Sacrifising driving experience over (on paper) efficiency.

Thanks for the information.

I only saw the online promotional technical details on the launch of the 1.5tsi years ago so I am really surprised that the variable turbo is not currently fitted to the most commonly used 150ps version. Maybe it had something to do with the protracted non availability of the 1.5tsi during their issues meeting WLTP standards and non-variable version was retro fitted? I did not even know there was a 130ps version!

 

If your A4 owning friend is averaging 5.5L/100 (51 mpg) then he is matching most one-off best journey reports from standard 2.0tsi owners, best averages are usually in the mid 40's mpg range. While the speeding fines here in Australia are probably not as high as Finland (where I think they are speed and income related) they still raise billions for the regional governments as many Australian drivers are slow to learn from their mistakes.

 

 

On 31/07/2023 at 09:35, SouthernComfort said:

Again, no opportunity to comment on the 1.5tsi in our market, but FWIW, having covered less than 2000km from new in my 1.4tsi 8 speed auto I have no complaints about fuel economy. Short distance suburban running returns around 7l/100km (40.5 mpg). Average highway/freeway driving averages 4.8l/100km (58.8mpg) although I have experienced as low as 4.5l/100km (62.7 mpg) depending on distance and constancy of speed etc. The 8sp is smooth with plenty of torque and compares favourably in every way with the Golf mk7 1.4tsi 7sp DSG that I had a few years back. Personally speaking, I don't see the benefit of 1.8 or 2.0 engines given the performance this 1.4 puts out. 

 

Having lately been used to a V6 CRD Jeep Grand Cherokee 4x4 (frequently pulling an off-road caravan), I don't even think about the Skoda's consumption day to day, it's pure joy!

Glad to hear you are enjoying your new car and getting good consumption with the Aisin 8 speed box. Modern torque converters are way better than they used to be although unbelievably there are still ancient 4 speed versions on a few brand new cars.

With your very good highway consumption I'd be interested to hear what revs the car is doing at the 110 kph legal limit in 'top gear'.

 

Adelaide petrol prices vary by up to 25% percent over a 2 or 3 week cycle. I recently bought 95 ron at a low A$1.78 a litre which at the time converted to 96 pence. The next day the price rocketed to A$2.25 as the school holidays ended.

There is a thread in the Briskoda "Off topic chat" zone entitled "£1 per litre" and dating from October 2014.

For British readers our 91 ron fuel is about 15 cents cheaper still although forbidden for use in VW group vehicles.

Edited 2 August, 20232 yr by Gerrycan

On 29/07/2023 at 23:58, GWoodhouse said:

That's seriously impressive 🤯 What does that equate to out of a tank? I thought I drove economically but clearly not! My 56mpg was mainly but not exclusively motorway / A roads.

 

Might start experimenting with some different fuels...

Don't expect much improvement if any just from changing fuels.

Comparisons are so difficult! There can be differences between individual vehicles which are otherwise identically specified but more likely it is due to the driving environment and individual driving styles. I suspect that @AlanOsborne is also a far more accomplished "hypermiler" than he is letting on

 

Differences between my wife and I driving the same car: a) highway, speed limit, no traffic - we get the same consumption b) highway with traffic - I'll get 10 to15% better c) urban driving conditions then I'll get about 30% better consumption. Hopefully my wife doesn't read this post.

2 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

Glad to hear you are enjoying your new car and getting good consumption with the Aisin 8 speed box. Modern torque converters are way better than they used to be although unbelievably there are still ancient 4 speed versions on a few brand new cars.

With your very good highway consumption I'd be interested to hear what revs the car is doing at the 110 kph legal limit in 'top gear'.

 

Adelaide petrol prices vary by up to 25% percent over a 2 or 3 week cycle. I recently bought 95 ron at a low A$1.78 a litre which at the time converted to 96 pence. The next day the price rocketed to A$2.25 as the school holidays ended.

There is a thread in the Briskoda "Off topic chat" zone entitled "£1 per litre" and dating from October 2014.

For British readers our 91 ron fuel is about 15 cents cheaper still although forbidden for use in VW group vehicles.

I am enjoying the car thanks mate, nothing to fault with it IMO. The comparison I made with the Golf 7spDSG and Octavia 8spSCG I found particularly significant i.e. some tried to tell me the torque converter route was a backward step, yet all the reviews (as well as forming my own opinion based on a test drive and now 5 months ownership) show otherwise - it's super smooth with slick gear changes. I must remember and take notice of the revs at upper cruising speed, good point. I have a light right foot which must help consumption I guess. The impact of individual driving style is often underestimated, although I can understand your reluctance to address it with the Mrs!

 

We also have the wild price fluctuations in Victoria, usually peaking around school hols and other peak holiday times. Looking at your figures in SA it seems we work from a higher base in this state eg. even at it's lowest point I've never seen 95RON down to $1.78, and $2.25 is more like our average with up around $2.35 or more at a peak. The gap between 91 and 95 is more like 20-22c here. I must say though, I usually stick to BP Ultimate or Ampol (aka Caltex) Premium and tend to avoid the 'cheapies' with their questionable fuel sources...  

Fuel Economy can be badly affected by traffic, about 4 years ago, did same commute in SW London every day, at same time, on route with quite number of traffic lights.  At time was getting about 37mpg indicated at end of journey, but when I didn't do it in rush hour was nearer 45mpg.   Conversely one day was bad accident and lots of stationary traffic, took nearly hour longer and averaged something like 28mpg.

 

Now I live in rural Wiltshire regularly see over 50mpg (and occasionally 60mph) for same car, so basically where you live affects it about 40%.  And I can get over double my lowest figure.

 

Mine is a 1.0tsi DSG (but not an Octavia) and experiments on my then regular commute suggested E5 super unleaded gave about 8% better mileage (rural) upto nearer 14% (urban) than using E10 95ron

 

Filled up yesterday, unleaded was 138.9p/l, super was 148.9, 10p more which is 7% more expensive, so buying super unleaded is no brainer with a 1.0 tsi.

 

I don't really know why the 3pot tsi is so much better with super unleaded but probably because it pulls better from low revs, so gearbox doesn't need to change down as much.  

5 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

I only saw the online promotional technical details on the launch of the 1.5tsi years ago so I am really surprised that the variable turbo is not currently fitted to the most commonly used 150ps version

Well, in promotional info they only focused on some things, which was very misleading, especially that they showed features of both engines (130 and 150hp) without indicating which has what. Initially it was very hard to find any info.

Now we know, that:

1. Variable geometry turbo and Miller cycle are only available in 130hp version, which is focused on fuel economy.

2. Special cylinder coating is only available in 150hp  version, which will be base of future plug-in hybrids, so has to be immune to frequent start and stop cycles.

5 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

Maybe it had something to do with the protracted non availability of the 1.5tsi during their issues meeting WLTP standards and non-variable version was retro fitted?

To be honest it's hard to say why they made such decision about turbo. Especially that new version (EA211 Evo Evo? :D) will have variable geometry in 150hm version.

5 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

If your A4 owning friend is averaging 5.5L/100 (51 mpg) then he is matching most one-off best journey reports from standard 2.0tsi owners, best averages are usually in the mid 40's mpg range.

That's why i said it greatly depends on driving style

His result is kind of special, yet as you can see possible to achieve.

I was test driving Seat Ateca with 190hp 2.0 (Budack cycle) for few days and it was nowhere near that result. My average was around 1 l/100km higher, than same Ateca with 1.5 150hp (around 8.5 vs 7.5).

5 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

where I think they are speed and income related

That's correct. Because of that they hold some world records in fines

I think currently highest one is 121000€ for 32km/h above speed limit.

However up to 20km/h over the limit fine is up to 200€. Above this limit it is caclulated in relation to income.

 

Edited 2 August, 20232 yr by Felix2021

5 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

they are speed and income related) they still raise billions for the regional governments as many Australian drivers are slow to learn from their mistakes

Well, not all Fins are driving according to speed limits.

I was visiting Finland last summer for holiday. Drove all the way from Poland.

Was driving according to speed limits (TA was helping here ) and usually was one of the slowest ones on the road

5 hours ago, SurreyJohn said:

Fuel Economy can be badly affected by traffic, about 4 years ago, did same commute in SW London every day, at same time, on route with quite number of traffic lights.  At time was getting about 37mpg indicated at end of journey, but when I didn't do it in rush hour was nearer 45mpg.   Conversely one day was bad accident and lots of stationary traffic, took nearly hour longer and averaged something like 28mpg.

 

Now I live in rural Wiltshire regularly see over 50mpg (and occasionally 60mph) for same car, so basically where you live affects it about 40%.  And I can get over double my lowest figure.

 

Mine is a 1.0tsi DSG (but not an Octavia) and experiments on my then regular commute suggested E5 super unleaded gave about 8% better mileage (rural) upto nearer 14% (urban) than using E10 95ron

 

Filled up yesterday, unleaded was 138.9p/l, super was 148.9, 10p more which is 7% more expensive, so buying super unleaded is no brainer with a 1.0 tsi.

 

I don't really know why the 3pot tsi is so much better with super unleaded but probably because it pulls better from low revs, so gearbox doesn't need to change down as much.  

 

Totally agree with what you say about how environment and style being such major consumption factors but a bit bemused by how much better your car is with the higher ron fuel, but hey if it works for you then .

There may be a couple of percent more calories for the potentially lower ethanol content for higher rated fuel and most manufacturers claims I've seen will say there is a potential 1% improvement in consumption for each individual increase in ron on a standard production engine, but only if the engine is designed to recognise the higher ron fuel.

I've used this example before but Mazda produce a turbo assisted SkyActive 2.5L engine that is designed to run on a range of fuel types in the US where they have the equivalent of 91 ron fuel (appearing as an even lower rating by a different measuring system) and presumably as high as 98/99 ron fuels for 'exotica'. Mazda say their engine produces 13 kw more power using the higher rated fuel which I think is close to a 7% improvement. Unfortunately they did not make any comparable statements regarding the effects on consumption.

 

5 hours ago, Felix2021 said:

 

1. Variable geometry turbo and Miller cycle are only available in 130hp version, which is focused on fuel economy.

 I think I have a desire to know more about this engine, how economical it is and bemoan the fact it was not available in Australia

.

I was test driving Seat Ateca with 190hp 2.0 (Budack cycle) for few days and it was nowhere near that result. 

We do get 140kw 2.0tsi engines here in Aus but there is no mention of whether they are Budack cycle and their official consumption figures are not that impressive imo.

 

4 hours ago, Gerrycan said:

We do get 140kw 2.0tsi engines here in Aus but there is no mention of whether they are Budack cycle and their official consumption figures are not that impressive imo.

I have no idea on what is available in Australia, but i think now all 190hp versions in Europe are Budack cycle. Previous incarnation, 180hp was using Otto cycle.

I might be wrong though, as for some reason they are not bragging about it that much, as they do for some other solutions.

1 hour ago, Felix2021 said:

We do get 140kw 2.0tsi engines here in Aus but there is no mention of whether they are Budack cycle and their official consumption figures are not that impressive imo.

When I was in Perth WA over a year ago, over the course of 2 weeks I spotted maybe 3 Skodas mostly Mk3 Superbs out of the 10s of thousand cars I saw on the roads.

 

Last month, over the course of a month I saw exactly 0 Skodas

 

The vast majority of cars there are Asian, ie Toyota, Kia, Hyundai, Isuzu, Mazda and surprisingly, I saw for the 1st time, a few dozen Chinese SUVs with names I've never heard of, some were EVs. A handful of Tesla model 3's.

 

Fuel in Perth is cheap compared to the UK but has very high sulphur content. Strangely the price varies significantly on a daily sometimes hourly basis. Standard petrol is 91 ron. The Kia Sportage I drove  had what I would consider as terrible fuel economy at around 9.5l/100km (30 mpg) no matter how gentle I drove. I put that down perhaps to the poor fuel quality.

 

A wide range of fuels are available in Aus, from cheaper generic outlets at the low end, to high profile brands keen to protect their reputations - most of the former I avoid.

 

Certainly there are vast numbers of Asian vehicle makes on our roads, however the mix you see in the eastern states is rather more varied, I would say Perth/WA isn't entirely representative of the whole country. In Victoria and NSW for example you would also count huge numbers of BMW, MB, VW, Audi. Ford and RAM pick- up's are in abundance. Tesla's and other EV's are in tiny numbers, they're still largely impractical in this country with massive distances to cover and a sparse recharging infrastructure. Skoda is a growing brand but not as established as VW, and long ordering delays is an issue as it is everywhere. Plenty of Mk3 Octavia's here on the east coast and steadily increasing but still small numbers of Mk4, heaps of Skoda SUV's. 

From what little I've read about cars actually fitted with the 2.0 Budack cycle engine, I get the the impression it neither lives up to the early hype about performance or economy. It probably fairs better in the NOx emissions where miller cycle (which Budack is a slight variation of) is known to be better than Otto.

 

I think VAG has stopped claiming anything on the basis they'll get hammered if they get found out and the class actions start again.

13 hours ago, xman said:

I think VAG has stopped claiming anything on the basis they'll get hammered if they get found out and the class actions start again.

Might be the case.

There's one more thing about those engines. Why they are so much dependant on driving style (more than other turbo engines)? Because it doesn't always use Budack cycle.

Budack cycle is only used at lower loads, and at higher load it goes to Otto cycle.

This change is done in a similar way as cylinder deactivation (moving camshaft to change valve timing, as this is how cycle can be changed), so they couldn't use ACT in those engines.

They could only do it, if they would keep it in Budack cycle all the time.

If you keep it below 120kmh its really eco, mine did 5.1l/100km on the last trip when A/C was working non-stop. Go beyond 150kmh and it starts to bite but besides the startup kangaroo - the engine is pretty good!

Hi MP1983, thanks for the information, as I have already stated, the economy of this 1.5 TSI engine is on a level with Diesels!  However, mine will ALWAYS 'Kangaroo' if I attempt to pull away before the revs drop below 1,000 rpm.  This normally takes a little while, usually until the SatNav has finished loading and I have turned off the Stop/ Start function.  After this, the car still requires careful clutch and throttle control for a few minutes of driving, but at least it doesn't kangaroo if I follow this procedure!  The car has had all relevant software updates and I have got used to this 'Feature' of the engine in return for it's economy and, indeed performance.