Skoda Octavia 2.0 DSG TDI Fuel Economy

[dazag]

When i pick up my 2.0 TDI vRS next week, I'll be checking the tyre pressures. I use the rule of thumb - what ever the highest pressure rating the tyres fitted are, I run about 10% below that pressure. So if it has a 44PSI Max rating, I'll run around 39-40 PSI, Better wear and better economy as advised by some of my local tyre dealerships. It may make the ride a little harsh with the new vRS suspension, but will have to see how that feels and adjust if needed.

Also have you looked at maybe sourcing a K&N air filter for it, so the engine can breath a little better?? Especially with a turbo engine it might help. Also have a look at the cold air induction path for the air box, make sure it's not obstructed in any way.

I'm kind of expecting to get around 6L/100km from my car anyway, so if i get any lower then that I'll be happy. What ever you do, dont run Bio-deisel, it's crap, make sure you run good quality deisel if you can, from BP etc.

[brad]

Also have you looked at maybe sourcing a K&N air filter for it, so the engine can breath a little better??

Allways a discussion provoking statement.

The reason K&N flow better is because they filter worse. If you're happy to accept that It might reduce your engine life (plucks figures out of bum: maybe by 10%) then go for it.

I've tried FinerFilter & Pipercross oiled foam (not oiled cotton like K&N) and decided I'll stick with OEM paper & change it more often.

The Skodas are on a 60,000km change cycle which seems an awfully long time. I had a look at my air filter last week (29,000km) and it was remarkably free of gross debris. I think I'll change it at 45,000km.

[spellbound]

re economy and johnny's tdi

My rs manual tfsi consistently gets 8.6l /100km city driving in adelaide , light traffic can use 5th gear .

Adelaide to melb 100km/110km per got 6.3l /100km and thats with some fanging .

There must be a problem somewhere

[WEDEL.1]

re economy and johnny's tdi

My rs manual tfsi consistently gets 8.6l /100km city driving in adelaide , light traffic can use 5th gear .

Adelaide to melb 100km/110km per got 6.3l /100km and thats with some fanging .

There must be a problem somewhere

Your getting the same as me on Adel/Melb trip. But is your 110 speed taken off the speedo, if so, you're about 8km/h slower than johnny & I. I run the speed off the sat nav. when doing 110 my speedo shows 118-9km/h.

Around town I get down to 4.3 to 5.2L/100km.

[JP-009]

I've got the Elegance 2TDI manual with the Oettinger re-flash.

Some interesting stuff to report on average fuel consumption with the Octavia after having a couple of trips from Canberra to Sydney...

A day trip with a weekends worth of stuff/luggage (for 2 adults, 1 toddler and 1 baby) returns 5.6 Litres per 100km.
Same trip, but fully loaded with the roof pod returns 6.6 litres per 100km.
Same trip, with a large square box attached to the roof returns 7.2 litres per 100km

I've never seen fuel consumption that high before with the 2TDI (Looks like the roof pod is a bit aerodynamic after all )

Around 'town' (in Canberra) we get average 6.8

Good news is that I am expcting the fuel consumption to improve later on as the engine continues to bed in, as she only has 10k on the clock at the moment

[spellbound]

Your getting the same as me on Adel/Melb trip. But is your 110 speed taken off the speedo, if so, you're about 8km/h slower than johnny & I. I run the speed off the sat nav. when doing 110 my speedo shows 118-9km/h.

Around town I get down to 4.3 to 5.2L/100km.

speedo variance that much , i was told they are optimistic 3 to 4 % , have to crank the cruise up then , maybe not, cant trust those vic cops.

[WEDEL.1]

When we have our T4 Transporter our speed check at the radar near Melb was Speedo 100km/h, Radar 92km/h.

[Ocy_RS_TDi_Kombi]

Driving around Melbourne in peak hour every weekday I'm averaging 6.9l/100km - this is over 5 tanks. This is driving from Blackburn to St Kilda Rd & back, medium to heavy traffic, approx 45km round trip with at least 10 minutes idling time one way. I'm not gentle with the car either.

Interesting I drove from St Kilda Rd to Knox City via Citylink, Monash Fwy & Eastlink and got 4.7l/100km without trying. Due to the roadworks on the Monash and cops everywhere the average speed was less than 70km/h.

I originally was expecting less than 5.0l/100km on constant highway running (like Melb to Mildura) when I first got it, but 5.6l/100km at an average speed of 109km/h with less than 7000km on the clock is good with me. Sounds like this will improve after 15k too.

Just on a side note we've got a current model Chrysler Grand Voyager (read 7 seater people mover/bus) with the 2.8 turbo diesel motor and 6 speed auto. It weighs 2.2 tonne and following the Octavia on a trip from Melb to Mildura and back recently it returned 7.8l/100km. Did the same trip with a pod on the roof and 8l/100km. Bloody impressive for such a big comfortable bus!

Cheers

[dazag]

Allways a discussion provoking statement.

The reason K&N flow better is because they filter worse. If you're happy to accept that It might reduce your engine life (plucks figures out of bum: maybe by 10%) then go for it.

I've tried FinerFilter & Pipercross oiled foam (not oiled cotton like K&N) and decided I'll stick with OEM paper & change it more often.

The Skodas are on a 60,000km change cycle which seems an awfully long time. I had a look at my air filter last week (29,000km) and it was remarkably free of gross debris. I think I'll change it at 45,000km.

Interesting - why do you think K&N are crap?? What testing have you done??I've run them on multiple vehicles with no problems, but it all comes down to how you service them. I service them regularly so have never had any indication of any fine dust particles are any other crap or water even getting by any K&N filter I've fitted.

But each to their own.

For me i race dirt bikes and work on multi million dollar aircraft and am very particular about my maintenance, so for me it's no drama, but maybe for the less mechanical minded it's more of a hassle??

[Johnny_dust]

It's quite strange with my fuel economy, as sometimes I get really good economy...eg when I was in Canberra last week I drove from Gungahlin to Queanbeyan and averaged 4.8 doing around 90km/h alot of the way. But driving around melbourne I usually get around 6.5 and occaisionaly high 5's but I have never gotten below 5 before.

Are there factory updates to the ECU which the dealer can provide which may improve fuel economy?

As for the speed, yes, when I was on the highway, 110km/h on my gps read around 118km/h on the speedo, if I go down to 100km/h on the gps fuel economy improved some.

Does anyone reccommend a diesel fuel additive to help clean injectors or are they are waste of money?

[dazag]

Does anyone log what fuel brand or servo they buy their fuel from to aid in their fuel economy calculations??

Aussie fuel is considered to be somewhat dogdy at the best of times, so depending on where you buy your fuel can be the difference in some of the varying numbers being quoted.
I know generally i think canberra has better quality fuel - I always get better economy from my vehicles when i fuel up in Canberra when visiting family/friends down there. Also some area's in Sydney are better for getting better quality fuel too.
Do people realise that government legislation allows servo's to "suppliment" their fuel by adding some additives during the weekly cycle to hopefully maintain the quality??

Just food for thought............

[brad]

Interesting - why do you think K&N are crap?? What testing have you done??I've run them on multiple vehicles with no problems, but it all comes down to how you service them. I service them regularly so have never had any indication of any fine dust particles are any other crap or water even getting by any K&N filter I've fitted.

But each to their own.

For me i race dirt bikes and work on multi million dollar aircraft and am very particular about my maintenance, so for me it's no drama, but maybe for the less mechanical minded it's more of a hassle??

ex motor mech. ex Aircraft Maint Engineer, qualified Mech Eng, so I think I'm mechanically minded enough

I didn't say they were crap. I said that the reason they flow more air is because they filter less. K&N filter best when they are dirty because the air galleries are clogged up a bit.

How much difference this makes to engine life depends on where you use your car. For the driving I do, it would be negligible but if it were in dusty conditions then I'm not so sure.

I just think there's a trade off for the poofteenth (1-2 kw) of performance that the K&Ns give you.

I wouldn't tell anyone not to use them but wouldn't recommend them either.

Are you at Williamtown on the RAAF contract? Boeing were the lead on that weren't they? Are they still cnuts to work for (I never heard a good thing about them when I was in the trade)? Is their OHS still crap? Have you got this dumpy little fat chick working for you? She'd be late 20s, ex QF apprentice Sydney, did a lot of work in the battery room. I remember she was pretty excited when she got the job up there in about 2006.

[brad]

Does anyone log what fuel brand or servo they buy their fuel from to aid in their fuel economy calculations??

Don't log the servo but do log the brand. Generally I just buy local as it's the nearly the cheapest in Sydney.

So far, much to my surprise, the dreaded Shell V-Power gives the best economy. I've tried the others but keep drifting back to Shell. My two local Shells are very busy so I assume the additives don't go stale (I believe Shell uses octane boosters rather than refining a true 98ron). It's certainly a better fuel than the old Optimax which my motorbike hated - air cooled, no O2 sensors, so I think it ran a bit lean on the Optimax.

Performance differences from fuel - butt dyno doesn't register a few kw difference between the different 98s but you can tell when there is 95 in it.

[gregozedobe]

speedo variance that much , i was told they are optimistic 3 to 4 % , have to crank the cruise up then , maybe not, cant trust those vic cops.

If you have climatronic a/c there is a digital speedo in that that is pretty accurate (there are a few threads around showing all the diagnostic info available from the climatronic), if not you can get a pretty good idea by using the av speed display in the mfd:

1 Find a road that is pretty level and with no sharp bends for a couple of Km.

2 Set the cruise control to what speed you want to check (eg speedo reading 117 for a "real" 110).

3 Reset the memory (1).

4 Cruise along at "117" for a Km or two.

5 Have a look at the memory (1) Average Speed, that will be very close to your actual speed (typically 4-9% less than the speedo).

Note that the Average Fuel Consumption displayed by the MFD is also optimistic on many VAG vehicles (just a coincidence that helps with marketing I suppose )

[dazag]

ex motor mech. ex Aircraft Maint Engineer, qualified Mech Eng, so I think I'm mechanically minded enough

I didn't say they were crap. I said that the reason they flow more air is because they filter less. K&N filter best when they are dirty because the air galleries are clogged up a bit.

How much difference this makes to engine life depends on where you use your car. For the driving I do, it would be negligible but if it were in dusty conditions then I'm not so sure.

I just think there's a trade off for the poofteenth (1-2 kw) of performance that the K&Ns give you.

I wouldn't tell anyone not to use them but wouldn't recommend them either.

Are you at Williamtown on the RAAF contract? Boeing were the lead on that weren't they? Are they still cnuts to work for (I never heard a good thing about them when I was in the trade)? Is their OHS still crap? Have you got this dumpy little fat chick working for you? She'd be late 20s, ex QF apprentice Sydney, did a lot of work in the battery room. I remember she was pretty excited when she got the job up there in about 2006.

Ahh fair call Brad, never can tell on these forums who has done what etc, but definatly sounds you know your stuff. I guess I shouldn't recommend K&N as such, but just suggest it as an option. I'm happy to use them for the driving i do etc and the maintenance regime i carry out, but that's what I'm willing to accept. Although I was looking at possibly trialing a BMC CDA Air Filter but not sure if they make one of the 2.0 TDI's.

No I'm not contracted to BOEING or BAE, I am a RAAFie, and yes i work at WLM as an ATECH. Been doing this stuff for 20 plus years.
Also been a race mechanic for a couple of people with the Shell Advance series ( road racing - Aussie 250 GP bikes, and production class ) and love getting my hands dirty on project cars etc, be it helping mates or car club members etc.

My Uncle is a mad VW enthusiest - he owns VW performance/Korsch Auto Re-cyclers on the Central Coast and he's always wanted me to buy a VW. I guess buying the Skoda is a step closer........ha ha ha