2.0 TDI Buying Advice

[mike77t5]

Hello, I am in the market for an a3 2.0 tdi 140. I do around 25k miles a year so fuel economy is very important to me. I have been looking at the facelifted a3's 2008 onwards and i have noticed that the 2008-2010 models have combined mpg of 55 and the 2010-2012 models have combined mpg of 64. I understand this is due to the introduction of stop start and other fuel saving tech. But i was wondering if there is noticeable mpg gains in the real world between the 2 models, and is it worth spending the extra on the start stop model?

[Guest 2]

Get a 1.9 TDIe - 68mpg all day long and £30 a year road tax.

Available in prefacelift and facelift flavours.

[rosso rocket]

Good advice here from Chris!

If you are doing that kind of mileage, I'd go for a 1.9e D too....and save a mint on the road tax.

[kalniel]

Hello, I am in the market for an a3 2.0 tdi 140. I do around 25k miles a year so fuel economy is very important to me. I have been looking at the facelifted a3's 2008 onwards and i have noticed that the 2008-2010 models have combined mpg of 55 and the 2010-2012 models have combined mpg of 64. I understand this is due to the introduction of stop start and other fuel saving tech. But i was wondering if there is noticeable mpg gains in the real world between the 2 models, and is it worth spending the extra on the start stop model?

If your real world driving matches the incredibly unrealistic emissions testing (<20mph average, simulated waits at traffic etc.) then yep. Otherwise, any gains will be hard to notice. Honest john has a real world MPG website where owners just enter their real data - it's not terribly accurate, but probably gives a better average real world driving comparison than the lab results do - manufactures simply tweak their cars to maximise the test figures as it's a key marketing resource.