Ford Focus equivalents

Many people complain about the economy of 1.25 fiestas, they do about thirty mpg in normal use, the (new) owners seem to think they will do vastly more.

A customer with a Mondeo diesel mentioned that his fuel economy had dropped from 55 to 48, we worked out that the drop coincided with changing his damaged michelin front tyre to a pair of cheapo nasties. (He was on holiday at the time, and the yokels said they couldn't get michelin's straight away)

Of course, the MPG in traffic depends on the trafic congestion, it can never be a fair measurement of MPG. Likewise, you can easily get 99 MPG on a downhil slope. But I read the MPG while on motorway after resetting the MPG panel at start of journey. This gives indication of a problem if the MPG is lower than expected.

A neighbour bought a new small car to replace a not so old very low mileage one, also bought new. Claiming because it was so much better with fuel. And quoted the official MPG. On a car really only used for shopping in London a couple of times a week. Sadly, it didn't have an OBC which would give an accurate MPG as used. She'd likely have been horrified to know the truth.

I managed to improve the lifetime MPG reading of a Prius on a trip to Scotland by 1mpg, where feasible it was rolling along at over 80 mph, at the end it showed 56.something. On the way back with less load and the owner driving, it dropped back to 55.something. Good fun. The difference was that I was using the cruise control for braking when needed, (so charging the power pack) he never uses cruise at all.

There was a Ford/Volvo association at one time and maybe some of the under bonnet/running gear is similar but my friends 2003(?) Volvo is too low to to the ground get in and out of comfortably and hits speed bumps with ease. It seems to have some unique quirks that are different from my Ford Focus. The Volvo seems have cost around 10 times more to repair in the last few years than I've spent on my Focus. Volvo spares seem to be premium priced and more difficult to source.

If all your journeys are in such conditions then it is a fair measurement of MPG.

The published figures probably don't correspond to real world driving for 99% of the population. You could argue that they can be used if comparing car A against car B but this is possibly a simplistic approach and liable to error if car B deviates by the published figures by more than car A in degraded driving conditions.

I do wonder if the cost saving in fuel achieved by modern ECO engines switching off is more than the replacement cost/garage charges when the starter motor gives out after 5 years or so.

And cheaper to insure. I heard somewhere the typical Corsa type chosen by folks with no history can have an unidentifable inflated premium, compared with them choosing a larger car. And red paint colour is apparently a no no.

Then again, a speed happy friend winds me up with tales on his £150 comp insurance on his Caterham 7, while I'm paying more than double for a tractor estate, other things being equal.

It was fun checking insurance quotes when I got the Boxster. Some made my eyes water. But my own insurance company came in at very little more than the previous BMW saloon.

And the extra cost of the special battery and the associated beefed up alternator and control systems etc.

You might sit in a queue for a long time if there is a problem ahead, as often happens on M4, also depending the time of the day. This ha nothing to do with the car's fuel performance. Also fuel consumption is high for the first 10 miles or so, until the engine reaches operating temperature. Hence high consumption on short journeys. A standardised MPG would assume warm engine, and no waiting in queues. I can easily get 40 MPG when on motorways, but it never lasts, e.g. cold starts and traffic congestion spoils the average result.

Yes I wonder too. However, I do switch of engine if cought out in stationary traffic for more than a couple of minutes. But most people around me don't! Sometimes you see the plainly reicidulous situation of cars ideling, waiting in a queue for a free pump at a petrol station.

Auto stop/start is just one technique manufacturers are using to get theoretical emissions down. (They are required to do this by legislation.)

In the real world, most cars that have auto stop/start can have it over- ridden, usually on a per-journey basis, and my limited experience of owners of such cars is that they usually do turn it off. Again, in the real world, there are so many parameters that the system uses to keep the engine running that they don't turn off all the time anyway.

Chris

we have had a Peugeot 306 1.9D for 17 years now on 198K miles and is used every day for local deliveries the only non service/consumable item that?s had to be replaced is the front brake flex pipes. ok and the radio stopped working some 12 years ago :(

I notice lots of cars starting up in stop start traffic these days.

With a decent starter motor and an engine tuned to start easily, I'd say it's not the load you might assume. Nothing like starting first thing on a cold day.

The reason the small number of people who have mentioned it to me say it's to do with convenience; they don't like the heating or A/C turning off.

Chris

A low-miler! A family member has a 2003 VW T4 Transporter on 350K now, still original drive train. In fact, very little has been replaced or has broken.

How on earth do you manage? ;-)

Chris

oddly enough, my sister also had a peugeot 306 with the same lump, it was extremely reliable and cheap to run. Apart from crash damage and electric window failure it was bullet proof, her clarion radio also went on the blink! The car was only replaced as my sister was getting older and found the clutch was a bit too heavy for her, so she bought an auto C3 from a friend, it has cost more in a couple of years use than the 306 did in 15. The most recent insult being 700 quid on solenoid replacement on the auto box at 5 years old and 25k miles.

The fuel economy is also pants at about 30mpg compared with the 306 50+mpg.

I had a Citroen ZX (petrol) from new which shared the same engine and running gear as one of the Peugeot models. It was never truly free of repair bills on parts that should have lasted longer but few expensive things started going wrong at around the 8/9 year mark and it was more cost effective for me to scrap it rather than repair. The warped front brakes disks were replaced under 9 months after purchase - which also warped until replaced with third party parts. At around 5 years the clutch release arm snapped. Rubber gaiters had a tenancy to split every couple of years.

The BMW Mini I had was reasonably 'smart' - if any systems were calling for heat/cold/power that couldn't be met, the engine would restart. Also, the system would not operate at all at times - usually the depths of winter.

I was wary of some hefty costs ahead, but after 5 years and 80,000 miles, the system still worked fine, and I rarely bothered to switch it off. My partner didn't like it though, and always switched it off on getting into the car.

I had read (not sure where) that for benefits to outweigh costs you'd need to be still for at least 30s for costs to outweigh benefits.

That must be annoying. The other issue of the battery is people fitting a standard battery instead of the special one, a normal battery can die in a couple of months on some stop-start cars.