DPF light and poor mpg 2009- 105 tdi

[mad evo]

I purchased the car new in July 2009 so far I have done 10,500 miles with the car being parked up for months at a time without any use.

I am a little concerned as my mpg is pretty poor to say the least, I do mainly shortish (under 15 miles) trips within the city. I average 39 mpg per full tank as per the OBC. I should be doing a lot more per gallon according to the official urban figures.

Also I drive the car very very gentle. Infact so gentle that my DPF light has been going on every few hundred miles and stays on for days regardless of how high I keep the revs. Tried doing 35mph in 2nd at around 4k rpm for a few miles, doesn't get rid of the light.

The car despite being 22 months old still has not told me it needs a service, I called VW few months back they told me I have to wait untill computer says yes.

So when will the computer say yes? when it turns 24 months old?

It also stutters a little when in high gears at low rpm where it never use to when it was newer, is this something which might be related to the DPF light?

Here was me thinking now with over 10k on it i'l get a little better mpg :zx11:

Have a 500 mile round trip on the M6 on Friday, any reccomendations what speed to put cruise on to achieve some good figures?

[Keithuk]

Well there have been many complaints about the fuel con with the 1.6 TDI being a lot less than VW claim. You don't say what you're getting or the type of driving you do?

You can decide which service interval suits you, mine is set for 10k/12 months just ask the dealer to reset the computer if you want it serviced at 10k or yearly. Other than that you're going to have to wait until 24 months or 20k which ever comes first. Do you have a service plan?

If you look at the options sticker on the first page if the service schedule it will either say QG0, QG1 or QG2 in the code. That is how it was set at the factory mine is QG1.

QG2 = Longlife 20k/24 months
QG0/QG1 = T+D Time and Distance 10k/12 months

You could add your car spec to your signature to save users asking?

[percymon]

In stop start urban traffic 39mpg is about right, you'd get more if you turned the engine off when stationary as per the bluemotion models. You're DPF light may have been on so long now that it won't go off even after a blast, self regens can only lower the soot level do much so Friday will be your chance to see whether a good run makes it extinguish.

For good mpg you need to be very careful with the throttle, but also do a lot of coasting into roundabouts etc rather than late braking. Anticipating traffic so you don't have to stop also helps hugely. Makes sure you tyre pressures are set correctly, maybe even inflated an extra 1-2psi over normal load recommendations.

Driving at 60mph with cruise on motorway will return 60mpg, 65mph around 58mpg and 75mph around 56mpg. I find 63mph is about the safespot for Eco driving on motorway, other car drivers expect HGVs to be going slow but seem to be surprised and caught out by slower cars.

You can also find out how long you have to service by pressing the left hand cluster button(looks like two windows overlapping) three times - first two presses scrolls through clock setting.