Mileage / Consumption : What to expect?

[Matt Wright]

Hi guys

My first long distance trip with my mate's 90 series yielded the following results. I was disappointed to say the least so wanted ot get a feel for what you guys get and what I should be aiming for. (and then look at injectors / tyres etc.)

The setup is :
A stock standard 1999 Colorado with just 75k miles on the clock
No mods at all. Road tyres
No smoke, good pull and acceleration
I drive like a granny - to save fuel!
Top speed usually between 55 and 65mph

Did a trip to France > Belgium > Holland this weekend and got
kms 425 265.6 miles
litres 64.6 15.7 gallons
l / km 0.15 0.06 gal / m
km / l 6.58 16.87 mile / g

Effectively in local speak, under 17 miles per gallon! I would have expected 20 - 25 at least?
I got 7-8km / l :: 20mpg on my 80 fulllllly laden with 4 people in it on our big trip..

Any ideas as to what could be wrong or is this normal?
Thanks!

 

[fridayman]

Petrol or diesel? Either way looks a bit low - would expect 20mpg+ on a slow motorway type journey.

 

[Matt Wright]

Apol. Autobox, Diesel. KZT engine..

 

[ignat]

Howdy Matt

My 97 KZTE fully loaded, RTT, bigger tyres (265/75/16 AT2's) etc gets 20mpg on the open road.

150 000 miles on the clock

 

[Matt Wright]

Hey Kevin! Welcome back.. Must catch up.. Hope the trip was awesome (I bet it was!)

20mpg?! With some 80 owners getting 30+, I would have expected waaaay more from the 90. Hm. Let's see if anyone else replies with some very different figures..

 

[Beau]

I think that is very low.

Im not too sure on how much mpg, But on my road trip last summer I got some good readings at different speeds. Firstly I have a 1997 deisel colorado with about 155,000 miles on the clock. It is standard other than 31.8" tyres and a slight tweak on the fuel pump for somemore power.

Driving at around 55-60 when 4th gear ticks over, I would get about 450 Miles from a tank of 65 litres, just before it goes into the reserve which is about 20-25 litres.

Driving at around 80-90 which I prefer I get a solid 400 miles from a tank, again about 65 litres.

The most I have ever got out a tank was 535 last summer, doing 50 mph on a long stretch of motorway in spain. I went into the reserve and when I filled her up she took a good 80 litres, meaning I had about 10 litres left.

To get the most performance and best consumption make sure you have good oil and right amount of oil, good fuel filter and good air filter.

 

[silvercruiser]

that does seem low i went to france earlier this year and got 27mpg doing 80mph on the french roads and im running bf a/t's but i do pump them to about 38 psi.

Joe

Edit: my collie is also an auto with 150k on the clock

 

[wobbly]

Just measured a tankful, combined motorway/local gave me 24.8mpg.

Thats a 3.0 Kzt but running mud tyres, so I would expect an improvement on AT type tyres.

Pete

 

[Steve H]

I think you may have miscalculated the amount of fuel used when you converted litres into gallons. 64.6ltrs /4.546= 14.2 gals which makes your consumption 265.6/14.2=18.7 mpg. Still a bit low. I just did a weeks trip to Devon and Cornwall and averaged 25.5 out of a 3.0ltr auto Colorado KZTE

 

[Bob]

My truck does an utterly consistent 31mpg on normal driving. 80 miles per day, 1/3 motorway, the rest B-roads, running on Bridgestone D689s (80% road I think). I know its the D4D and has more power, but I still get 18mpg when pulling my very un-aerodynamic 16ft box trailer.

Something not right with that machine I suspect

 

[Matt Wright]

Thanks all, I'll send results from the next tank on Sunday.. Driving up to stoney cove to go scuba diving crazy. Perhaps
Appreciate the info.. Quite enjoying being on the 90 thread!!

 

[sae70]

Driving up to stoney cove to go scuba diving

Blimey! There's a name I've not heard for a while! I couldn't tell you how many hours I've spent in that pond, but plenty over the years, It'll be fresh that's for sure, hope you've got a dry suit and a Weezle or two or three The last time I was up there they were just finishing off the new building/dive center, not so new now I guess Get some piccys if you get a chance I'd love to see what it all looks like up there now. Hope you have a good day

PS - When I first bought Fiery she was giving me around 24mpg with 265/75/16 A/T tyres, but now she has the 255/85/16 KM2's fitted she gives just a tad under 22mpg, but I don't hang about

 

[Ducktape]

'02 D4D (KD1 FTE) still standard with 265/70/16 HT tyres and roof rack, semi-loaded with tools...

On the last tank which I deliberately tried to run empty to change the filter in the diesel tank I got 450miles and filled her up after with 87.3litres (Yes that was £123 something... ) Quick calculations brings me to 23.44 miles/gallon or 5.3 miles/litre but that was the MRS driving to work in London traffic...!

On the motorways I normally get 5.8miles/litre or 25.84miles/gallon up to 6.1miles/litre or 27.17miles/gallon at around 70mph of coarse...

As a general rule I know I can reach 500miles on a full tank with a few fumes to spare... but in off-road conditions I get the same figures as the MRS on asphalt...

 

[wobbly]

Matt

Out of interest, how did you measure the amount of fuel you used?

Pete

 

[Matt Wright]

Hi Pete

Good question. I used the method we used on every fill on our 18 000 mile journey through Africa which is :

Fill tank to the brim, ie when you can see the diesel just below the fill line in the fuel inlet yes it's overfilling but we had to squeeze every drop we could carry!)
Given that you can see the fuel, and if you fill to the same line next time, you know you're filling to the same level

Next step is to drive........ till nearly empty. The longer the better to give you more accurate results over a longer period / differing conditions.

Fill to the same fill line as mentioned above
Record the amount of diesel put in in litres
Divide by the km's / miles driven
(I used rough figure above ie 4.1 litres to the gallon and 1.6km's to a mile)

Does that make sense?

 

[Matt Wright]

Driving up to stoney cove to go scuba diving

Blimey! There's a name I've not heard for a while! I couldn't tell you how many hours I've spent in that pond, but plenty over the years, It'll be fresh that's for sure, hope you've got a dry suit and a Weezle or two or three The last time I was up there they were just finishing off the new building/dive center, not so new now I guess Get some piccys if you get a chance I'd love to see what it all looks like up there now. Hope you have a good day

I'll post some pics in the trips section Steven We recently dived Buckland lake and Some other one - both in the south east.. One was ok. I saw 3 fish. Or it was the same fish 3 times. My mate saw 2 different typs tho!
The other lake was more of a horror swamp. Bottle green to black. Sunken aeroplanes and boats + a 15m well to explore.. Won't be going back there! It's been 12 degrees lately so not too bad. I have a drysuit - hence still being alive..
That said, Cape Town gets down to 9 degrees sometimes

 

[mudplug]

My 2000 Colorado KTZ engine returns me around 26 mpg, and that is constant no matter if I am towing my caravan (yes I know that sounds strange?) or driving without it, one thing I always do though is keep an eye on the rev counter and try to keep it around 2000 rmp, this equates to about 50/60 mph it has done about 50,000 miles on the engine and I run thin tyres 7.50 / 16 so yes, 17 mpg sounds very bad

 

[silvercruiser]

Hi Pete

Good question. I used the method we used on every fill on our 18 000 mile journey through Africa which is :

Fill tank to the brim, ie when you can see the diesel just below the fill line in the fuel inlet yes it's overfilling but we had to squeeze every drop we could carry!)
Given that you can see the fuel, and if you fill to the same line next time, you know you're filling to the same level

Next step is to drive........ till nearly empty. The longer the better to give you more accurate results over a longer period / differing conditions.

Fill to the same fill line as mentioned above
Record the amount of diesel put in in litres


Divide by the km's / miles driven
(I used rough figure above ie 4.1 litres to the gallon and 1.6km's to a mile)

Does that make sense?

it should be 4.55 litres to the uk gallon.


Joe

 

[wobbly]

Hi Matt

Yep, that all sounds about right, the fill point is the one thing that has to be constant.

What was the load, was there a trailer?

Pete

 

[Matt Wright]

Hi Pete

Stock standard truck, road tires, 2 backpacks and 5 spanners..
Been out the whole week so will start investigating this weekend and get back to y'all. Might do a service for good measure as I don't know the history. See if that has any difference.
Right now I'm sitting on just over half a tank and I've only done 202kms!
Mixture of highway driving at 55 - 60mph @2000 - 2200 revs and some stuck in traffic London "driving"