1.6 TDI Bluemotion Fuel Economy

[Bob_S]

SWMBO has driven the first 111 miles on this tankful and MFD 2 was showing an average of 47.9mpg. I took the car for a 90 mile return cross country trip this afternoon which took in a good mix of roads, with 50% being dual carriageway, some town work and the rest 40's and national speed limit single carriage ways. I was sticking to speed limits (or thereabouts) and holding 72mph on the cruise on the dual carriageways.

MFD 1 showed an average of 58.9 and MFD 2 was up to 52.7 at the end of my journey.

I think the moral of the story is to not let SWMBO anywhere near the driving seat!!

[Bob_S]

The car has just passed the 14000 mile mark now and it is starting to loosen up. I filled up today and this is what I got:-

645.0 miles
54.05 litres/11.89 gallons
54.3mpg (MFD2 showing 55.1)

Average over 6400 miles is 50.9.

It is very close to what I see as a realistic consumption when compared to the official combined figure. I always take that and subtract 10mpg to get what I think is achievable and the latest tank is very close to that.

[neverbuybluemot]

Fuel consumption and Bluemotion is a Hot topic since the 1st ones came out Due to VW advertising very over the top claims that no owners could ever match, However the 1.6 TDi.appears to be one of the worst for thirst, ours is no exception being the Bluemotion, which the way it is marketed you would think it would be somewhere close to the figures VW publish... but isin fact nowhere near, I keep reading road tests of "its normal and very fuel efficient? " Ours isnt normal to drive it is a B"stard to drive smoothly, you have to rev the nuts off it to pull away even on the straight whilst in traffic jams you cant just chug along in gear It will simply stall, once this happens it feels like a few minutes before it will fire back into life, Do the press get "FIXED" cars to try which will prove to be close to normal? (echos of Jaguar and Aston Martin back in the 1960s with their E type and DB5 claiming 150 mph...? they struggled to do 140 mph) whilst the mere mortals who were drawn into beleving the hype are left with a product that doesnt deliver .
The distinct lack of Torque means you have to by nature work the engine harder which means using more fuel and a furious drive with what feels like over 300 gearchanges just to keep up with traffic, even the change up light thinks it has more Torque This isnt a car to be used in the Urban, it doesnt like stopping and pulling away as it can put the soot light on which means an even longer journey just to solve a problem, However it is very nice on Motorways (70 mph = 2100 rpm) Saying that you cant just flex your right foot and expect to overtake anything there is nothing there, whilst fuel consumption on a good motorway blast produces an average of 41 mpg (38 or less in the urban)
Dealers cant find anything wrong with our example even after 3 Diss reports one of which was from an equally usimpathetic Dealer, it has had an ECU upgrade from VW technical support (courtesy of Whatcar Magazine) as you wont get anywhere using the VW Helpline who cannot help you in anywayand if you mention Bluemotion and fuel consumption they get a bit snotty... VW Technical support (via Whatcar) also advised never to use the stop start (we never do as it is dangerous, it cuts out exactly as you are about to pull away, you cant bump start the car either even if the car is rolling it must be on the key), Using S/Start will clog the DPF filter, so why do they insist on fitting them?.
And dont get me started on the build quality, within a year it has had 2 new alloy wheels due to corrosion, Dealer said there has been huge warranty work on mk6's (VW Penny Pinching?) and various trim bits that have fallen off not to mention plagued with rattles.
So we have a car that is not fit for purpose, An ornament for the Drive and we are not the only ones complaining about "Bluemotion" the 1.6 TDi or VW group itself.

[Bob_S]

I don't know if we will see onepostwonder again, but I would be interested in hearing what speeds he drives at to only achieve 41mpg on a motorway run. I have just got back from a run to Galway in Ireland and the majority of the journey was motorway/dual carrieageways. I cruise at 70mph and the MFD was showing an average for the full journey of 57.5mpg. My brim to brim tank figures are very close in accuracy to what the MFD shows. The last tankful of 499 miles showed an average of 54.9, it taking 41.33 litres to fill up.

The consumption has been improving with mileage, the car having 15000 miles on the clock now (8000 covered since I bought the car). My overall average since getting the car is 51.3mpg, but the last 6 tankfuls have not dipped below 52.2 with a high of 54.9.

You say the stop/start is dangerous. It only activates when you put the car into neutral so perhaps it is your timing that is causing the issue? If you keep the car in gear the stop/start won't activate.

I have not heard of the stop/start causing the DPF to clog, but I have yet to see the DPF warning light come on during my ownership of the car.

I personally do not believe the fuel figures that are claimed and I have always considered that a reasonable average that should be attainable is 10mpg less than the claimed figure. This is something I am getting very close to and I believe it will be attained with more miles on the clock.

[neverbuybluemot]

2nd post wonder... Our car now has 14k we bought it new (59) and is apparently one of the early cars...? (have VW put wrong to right?) The speeds we drive at vary but usually do the same mileage each week which is a mixture of mostly urban but odd blasts of motorway, We also have a 10 year old mk4 Golf (90) TDi which l am not making this up delivers at least 20 mpg more than this supposed highly efficient offering.



Which is why we use the old Golf instead of the new also it is nicer to drive in the urban whilst we keep the mk6 for long journeys due to the cost, as for the MFD as mentioned it now displays higher figures (49, very rarely over 50) due to the last ECU update but the fuel consumption is still the same... 41.



Our old mk4 with a light foot has displayed over 70mpg and a trip to the shops is usually 58mpg which is believable as the fuel gauge rarely moves, The Bluemotion gauge moves in alarming increments.



We have 3 half yrs to go on finance but cant see us keeping this dreadful car that long.

[Bob_S]

2nd post wonder... Our car now has 14k we bought it new (59) and is apparently one of the early cars...? (have VW put wrong to right?) The speeds we drive at vary but usually do the same mileage each week which is a mixture of mostly urban but odd blasts of motorway, We also have a 10 year old mk4 Golf (90) TDi which l am not making this up delivers at least 20 mpg more than this supposed highly efficient offering.

Your car isn't much older than ours, which was first registered on 1st September 2010. Are you saying your older Golf averages 70mpg?

Which is why we use the old Golf instead of the new also it is nicer to drive in the urban whilst we keep the mk6 for long journeys due to the cost, as for the MFD as mentioned it now displays higher figures (49, very rarely over 50) due to the last ECU update but the fuel consumption is still the same... 41.

You still haven't mentioned the speeds you drive at on motorways. That would be useful to know. Is your fuel consumption measured by brimming the tank and working it out the old fashioned way?

Our old mk4 with a light foot has displayed over 70mpg and a trip to the shops is usually 58mpg which is believable as the fuel gauge rarely moves, The Bluemotion gauge moves in alarming increments.

On our trip to Ireland last week we did a 60 mile journey on N roads just keeping up with the flow of traffic and the MFD showed 69mpg at the end of the journey. I have also seen mid 50's on the MFD on the trip to the shops. The car has done 410 miles on the curent tank of fuel and is just above the halfway mark on the gauge.

We have 3 half yrs to go on finance but cant see us keeping this dreadful car that long.

Maybe if the car is disliked as much as you say it is then the right thing to do is to sell it now?

[neverbuybluemot]

=Bob_S;666831]Your car isn't much older than ours, which was first registered on 1st September 2010. Are you saying your older Golf averages 70mpg?]


Yes it can manage this, for instance a recent trip to Wales was near this figure which included a good blast along the twisty B roads, despite it belching out black soot.



[You still haven't mentioned the speeds you drive at on motorways. That would be useful to know. Is your fuel consumption measured by brimming the tank and working it out the old fashioned way?]

Are you a VW car salesman? I drive to the speed limits, sometimes a bit higher, but dont thrash the mk6 due to how much fuel it uses, In the early days we tried many different ways because we thought could it actually be us not the car...However nothing much changes,keeping the revs low makes the car bunny hop something reminiscent of an Austin Metro we had many years ago, we have learned to keep the revs above 1800 rpm and below 2500 which somehow makes the consumption better... but 1800 rpm is exactly its last flat spot.



I have noticed our mk4 rarely goes over 2000 rpm, unless on motorways simply because we dont need to push it any higher, we let the torque do the work.



We used to work out the consumption using http://www.mpg-calculator.co.uk/ using a full tank, which I did keep a record of to show VW Dealers just how much money it was costing us, I cant be bothered now but have kept every receipt and reset the mileage.



[On our trip to Ireland last week we did a 60 mile journey on N roads just keeping up with the flow of traffic and the MFD showed 69mpg at the end of the journey. I have also seen mid 50's on the MFD on the trip to the shops. The car has done 410 miles on the current tank of fuel and is just above the halfway mark on the gauge.]



We have just got back from North Yorkshire, we didnt fill to the brim but we achieved nearly 400 mile on £50.00, A trip to the shop can show as low as 29mpg.





[Maybe if the car is disliked as much as you say it is then the right thing to do is to sell it now?

We have tried to reject the car at 2k but because we struggled to get 30 mpg, (it didnt jump around either) But the Selling Dealer advised us to wait until 5k then everything should be nicely loosened up? It did get better to the sum of 41 ish But Because we took the Dealers advice and waited for more miles It was even harder to reject the car Hence the Whatcar route which didnt really do much either.



We did get an updated ECU (believed to be the program from Audi A1,?) which calmed the DPF regeneration down but still rears its ugly head but has not improved the mpg one bit, Technical Support phoned me(who advised about Stop Start, incidentally ours cuts out when dipping the clutch sometimes whilst it has a mind of its own when it shuts down, We always switch it off, unless we forget) but couldnt help me anymore and was under the impression they would take the car in for further investigation?? Then I got email from VW UK saying We cannot help you any further,Quite Disgusting really.



Trading it in.... 1st was against a used 2.0Tdi (the one we should have bought in the 1st place) However we noticed Dealers have huge stocks of 1.6TDi's but only a handful of the nicer 2.0Tdi, which command a Handsome premium, whilst our Bluemotion despite having a few extras was offered a pitiful amount which didnt make economic sense,



2nd time was against another 1.6 but the basic 90 bhp, he didnt offer a price but the salesman embarrassed himself when it failed to get near our mpg (using the MFD)



We are going to wait until next year when the new Golf is out (or the mk5 c version some say it will be the Seat Leon with new headlights?) which to be fair am not happy at all with Vw products, we tend to run cars till they drop but will have to fork out again, failing that probably move onto Kia or Hyundai?

[Bob_S]

No, I'm not a VW salesman, just the owner of a Golf Plus 1.6TDi Bluemotion. You say your old Golf can manage 70mpg but the question I asked is if it averages 70mpg overall.

If you managed 400 miles on £50 of fuel, then assuming you paid £1.38 per litre that would come in at 7.96 gallons and would equate to just over 50 mpg

[vince70]

I saw a test a few years ago on top gear on some such program where they put two identical golfs next to each other, one with 20,000 on the clock and another with 75,000 on the clock.
The one with 75,000 on the clock was running a lot quicker as it really took that long to run in properly, I Imagine the petrol consumption on your car will get better with age and mileage.
Theres a thread on here somewhere where people are getting over 450000 miles out of there cars, and a lot of those are petrol engines. so going by that I would say that your diesel engine has got to do a few more miles.
Also if the car is driven to slowly all it will do is coke up, sometimes a bit of thrash to clear the cobwebs out does them the world of good.

[neverbuybluemot]

No, I'm not a VW salesman, just the owner of a Golf Plus 1.6TDi Bluemotion. You say your old Golf can manage 70mpg but the question I asked is if it averages 70mpg overall.

If you managed 400 miles on £50 of fuel, then assuming you paid £1.38 per litre that would come in at 7.96 gallons and would equate to just over 50 mpg

It was 385 miles and well into the fuel light, When we originally filled up it already had some diesel in but not much (the light wasnt on! but was close to the red) at a guess it probably returned about 45mpg? an improvement non the less....

As for keeping it until the miles pile up.. We dont have the money to try this theory out, not that we have the money to replace either but it is the way it drives that makes keeping it so unappealing, A few Bluemotion owners on tinternet have also commented on this problem as have GTD 170 2.0TDi owners However I havent found any complaints from the newer Common Rail 140 bhp 2.0 TDi wheather Bluemotion or not?

Incidentally our old mk4 has been pretty consistant thoughout its life... though is getting smokey!