another MPG question
 

my last 4 weekly MPG's are:

17.6 (using kickdown a lot)
18.8 (slow / gentle acceleration)
18.7 (slow / gentle acceleration)
17.4 (using kickdown a lot)

i tried mixing up driving styles a bit to see what differences are made

it is a 140bhp, petrol, 2.4 N/A auto
All urban, traffic tends to be quite start/stoppy on my journeys

is that about right or should I be looking for answers

it runs perfectly smooth, not smokey, oil stayed at same level since changed nearly 3000miles ago, not losing any other fluids, no other known reasons for concern. I seem to have a slight vacuum at the oil filler cap (what I think is the usual PCV test?) and no smoke from dipstick hole, Idles around 1000, reaches temp quick and stays there. Tyres pumped up, windows always closed, no roof rack. I do have a slightly weighty sub box (twin 12's) permanently over the back axle. and some not very weighty other permanent stuff in boot, work bag, spare clothing and so on

just checking

ta

My 2000 (P80 V70) 2.4 170 auto was showing low MPG like this.

Gave the MAF sensor a good clean with electrical contact cleaner and with mixed driving my mpg has gone up and is now just touching 22mpg, wheres before it was at 17.

I think offical MPG is 22.6mpg urban.

cheers, I'll be giving that a go then :thumbs_up:

By comparison...
 

My last 13 monthly (Feb. 20 through Feb. 21) MPG's are (note-US gallon):

23.73 ----snow tires/local
24.40 ----snow tires/local
24.54 ----corona hits
29.65 ----corona highway
26.21 ----corona mixed
25.62 ----corona mixed
24.64 ----corona mixed
26.23 ----corona mixed
27.20 ----corona mixed
19.29 ----token driving, (moved car to allow snow plow passage)
32.93 ----slow highway driving experiment + switch to premium
28.20 ----corona mixed
23.47 ----token driving, very cold,

I'm a very consistent driver. Forcing downshifts around town is something I'd never do.
Even if I wanted to sense a downshift, I'd do it on a highway so I could let the old girl clear her bowels.
You might have a heavy right shoe.

Mine's a 167bhp, gasoline, 2.4 N/A auto.
My "local" is all suburban where I can pick my times to drive

Your mileage doesn't seem right to me given the Imperial gallon is "20% larger" than the US gallon.
We use the 5,280 foot mile (ha-ha)

Make sure your electrical cleaner leaves no residue (lube).
I use real MAF sensor cleaner for that reason.

My N/A requires the 3-pronged Volvo spark plugs. Substitutes cause problems.
Does your 140 have the same requirement?
Have you been messing with your sparkypoos?

Have you changed tire/wheel sizes thus confusing your odometer?

I'd dose two consecutive tankfuls of fuel with a good cleaner. Chevron's Techron concentrate is lauded here.
The PEA is said to clean the injector nozzles upon shutdown. The product is used during local driving for that reason.

thanks for that, I do have a heavy right foot this is true, part of the reason I didn't want a turbo because I like not having points on my license. I knew if I had boost I would definitely use it. lots.

no change to sparks. new ones are on my to do list

no change to wheels or tyres

have been thinking about additives, so thanks for the recomendation.

I just put some high octane in, im not sure if that will help to clear anything out, or literally just cost me more money lol

Mine is a manual with 120k miles and regular maintenance.

My best mpg was 34.1 measured over a 3 month period with lots of longer trips and cruising at no more than the legal limit.

Around town I get 26 to 28 averaged over 12 months since the virus struck

Running fully laden with 5 kayaks on the roof , and 5 paddlers, I still get 29 mog over a 600 mile weekend trip with about 450 to 550 miles of motorway.

Your figures seem low to me.

thanks, I havent tried any long journeys since I started noting the mileage..

I did a run down to camber sands before the 2nd wave which is a long highway trip but that was also the journey where i realised I was leaking petrol from my filler tube (now sorted) so there was no accurate way to know how much I'd actually put in and how much I'd poured on the floor of the garage

i can only compare urban/around town mpgs at the moment, but I agree it still sounds like mine are low. ordered the cleaner spray and some new sparks though so lets see what difference that makes

19mpg is on the high side. Urban driving with short distances between stops gets about the worst mpg. I still find it on the high side. When I got my 2.4 na automatic I was getting around 15 mpg mostly busy city driving. I'm now rather close to 23 mpg in summer time. When you drive on motorway at 60mph, how does the power feel in the 5th gear (without downshifting) ? When my car had bad mpg, the 5th at 60mph felt like it was completely gutless, that was an indicator something wasn't right. I did a lot of maintenance so not sure which helped the most. PCV, injector cleaning with ultrasound, fixed the intake air thermostat, 4 prong spark plugs, NGK front oxygen sensor, transmission fluid. I also tried cleaning the piston rings believing they may get stuck when the PCV is old and neglected, from sludge build up on the ring lands. When I first got the car the engine would scream a lot when revving to 3000 rpm, now it's much smoother and quieter. On 2001-2004 the SMI steering rack may also get clogged and cause engine power loss and heavy dull steering feeling

Been there too. I smelt petrol whenever I brimmed the tank when filling up, but no signs of a physical leak. It turns out the fuel filler hose had perished.

Simple job they said , 4 hours of labour to replace a £20 part, at least it is now fixed for the next 100k miles I hope.

lol i thought the same, it's only a little rubber tube how hard can it be? 4 hours on my driveway, nowhere closer, knuckles all skinned, sod it I'll give that to the garage. at least I already had the part ready for them

they gave it back swearing and muttering at me under their breath.. only charged me £120 quid though I thought that was a bargain. gave him an extra tenner for a beer or two, he earned it

Cleaned MAF and immediately idle settled at about 800-850 ish

whereas before it was sat at 1000 all day. I suppose it goes to show there is at least some minor improvement in metering.

spark plugs due during the week (volvo branded) anyone know what the gap should be?

bottle of Wynn's chucked in and will do another bottle in a couple of weeks

just keeping thread updated for future readers

summary of things done:
new tyres, 35psi
two bottles of cataclean
a few injector cleaners (still a few more doses left in bottle)
blocked a slight gap in airbox (not sure if made any difference)
cleaned MAF
new spark plugs

originally 17-18mpg (urban only)
latest reading 21.5mpg (urban only)

point to note urban in my case means lots of start stop traffic, lots of speed-bumps and schools on my route (people just randomly stopping on yellows to eject their little treasures) so I think that's about as good as it gets

still considering the 140-170bhp remap not for power but because I read it's actually slightly a more efficient map.. anyone think that seems likely?

still working on getting everything tip-top before i do any remapping though

If you're feeling frisky you might consider changing your front O2 sensor. It has all to do with fuel richness. The rear sensor has to do with catalyst efficiency.

While young in terms of mileage you're beyond the 10-12 year lifetime often cited. Is there a different "expected lifespan" for Volvo upstream sensors?

Said sensor in my '02 died after its 11th birthday. My fuel use went up 20% overnight. Seriously, I saw the fuel gauge fall faster.

you know what, I was thinking that when I was looking at my injectors reading as +1 or so, what could be causing a slight overfuel..

that's confirmed my though process so yeah thanks I think I will do that. even 1mpg over a year will more than cover the cost

can someone confirm which one is right

https://www.skandix.de/en/spare-part...da-sensor/621/

just thinking I might order it up while at work, if not I'll check VIDA later

there's diagnostic (post?) and regulating (pre?)

genuine Volvo item unused, ebay, £90. boom

I'll snap that up yes please

to confirm if anyone else wondered, post above appears to be correct

Can I ask please for recommendations of what to clean the MAF sensor with? The proper cleaner is really expensive, and i wanted to know if there is a cheaper alternative.

Thanks

As advised by T5R92011 on page 1 I just used electrical contact cleaner, i found one that said 'leaves no residue' - it got rid of the muck, and didn't cause any problems for me

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

you need about 1/50th of the tin so spending a lot of 'proper' stuff is definitely a waste of money

and the lady at A1 auto has a simple, well explained video as usual https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6PRmGzF5AM

I bought the NGK (said to be the OE manufacturer) over Volvo branded due to the gross price difference at the time. The current prices listed in the link above are much more competitive (aka sane).

Electric cleaner spray and "real MAF" spray are the same price-possibly $1 more- here (New Jersey).

I've read appeals for both the residue free cleaner and the real thing but have never seen any demonstration of one over the other.

Once blueing some metal I used electric cleaner as a final prep. The residue, which is a lubricant I believe, made the finish all rainbowed (like oil in water) and swirly....not blue.

just a 2 second google here shows MAF cleaner ranging from £6-15, and the electrical cleaner was £4? so yeah there's not a lot in it .. but because you use literally like 2 x 4 second blasts at most is it really even worth worrying about it, the rest of the tin will probably sit on my shelf unused for years. If I was running a garage or something I'd probably buy the right stuff I suppose

proof was in the pudding tbh, my sensor had crud on it, and the stuff i linked cleaned it off perfectly. the sensor hasn't thrown up a fault and the car idles lower, which I took to mean metering better. as for actual mpg improvement because of that one tiny job, well who knows

agreed full price 'proper' sensor is a rip off! If I didnt find the volvo one on ebay going cheap I probably would have tried a denso or NGK I suppose. saying that I replaced one on an old scooby and the dealship shafted me for £250 but the cheap ones I tried before (2 tries totalling about £100) didn't work, so swings and roundabouts I guess. sometimes you get a bargain .. sometimes you get a case of cheap-out and pay twice

front O2 sensor received and replaced..

wont have a real tangible idea of difference to mpg until a good week of driving but it made some very minor changes to the fuelling, and to pre/post cat readings.

not really a lot but then every little bit helps I suppose

before:
https://i.ibb.co/qm4bvRT/idle-old-sensor.jpg

after:
https://i.ibb.co/rxgkhkr/idle-new-sensor.jpg

has anyone else got any suggestions as to why my fuel trims are showing plus figures. or maybe a confirmation that those readings are totally fine?

this is all at idle but I revved for a bit and the fuelling didnt seem to change. I'll check again next week but my understanding is 'long term' is only like 20 seconds or so

beyond that really I'm happy to just leave it alone now, pending a test out on the longer roads it seems to be running perfectly. to drive it's smooth as silk and pulls well no hesitancy

So this is probably a total noob mistake but no-one else seems to have spotted it (or maybe just left me to work it out for myself)

apparently area 1,2,3,4,5 is not the different injectors, it's the different 'areas' of the map. 1=idle, 5= full chat, and 3 sections in between

that now makes more sense looking at the gradual increase in values

and it can allegedly take 3 or more drive cycles to recalculate

I still feel like I should be trying to get them closer to zero, so I'm going to try a can of WD40 and see if that shows up any air leaks around the inlet anywhere

interested to know what other peopls's fuel trims are, especially anyone with a N/A 2.4 who gets decent mid 20's urban or good solid mid 30's overall

did a bit of A road driving to try and access all of the fuelling map and give it a chance to re-calculate

now showing
1 - 0.93
2 - 0.93
3 - 1.02
4 - 1.09
5 - 1.12

so not much change from previous

I did ask around about the 140-170 remap, and there's a place near me who will do it including dyno before and after for around £400 ... tbh that's a bit more than I was thinking

I'd have to see an improvement of 3-4mpg over a whole year to break even on that, but it might still be worth it for the extra oomph. on my map apparently bhp flattens off hard at around 4.5k (Which to be fair I can feel when I try to overtake) and the newer map pushes on past that to 6k or so which is where the extra 30bhp comes in.. the bottom end of curve looks nearly identical.. it is tempting I have to admit

this weeks mpg 21.5 but I have added roof bars, so keeping the same average is actually indicative of a slight improvement IMO. And although I did go on an A-road, let's just say I wasn't being economical

Remapping is good, but the more power you have, the more tendency you'll have to use it = less mpg.

lol for the first couple of months or so I reckon that's probably very true, but the novelty would soon wear off, most of my driving is sub 40mph and it's hard / pointless keeping revs high in an auto at those speeds

and then when I am on a fast road, more often than not I have the family in the car and that tends to keep me in check

not like the old days of sticking on some drum and bass, hop over two lanes and nail it

£400 sounds expensive, but 30bhp is a big increase.

exactly, and it would be backed up by and before and after dyno so it's not just some little kid with a laptop going 'i'll chip your car innit bruv'

Also the original idea was the newer map is reportedly more efficient down the bottom end which I use a lot more, but I'm not entirely convinced

I still want to run it a while longer first to see if any other issues pop up or if I can get the numbers down in other ways

plus, there's a numberplate I've got my eye on for about £600 and tbh that's more appealing lol

Depends how much you want the extra power, but by the sounds of it, you don't use it much anyway with the driving you do. I don't think you'll gain much mpg from it though... if the power is there, you'll want to use it. I know the tendency wears off after a while, but what's the point in getting a remap adding extra power if you don't really use the 30bhp extra to its advantage? I know its claimed to be more efficient at the bottom end, but I'd like to see it to believe it.

You might as well keep the £400, or spend it on something else in my opinion. Its a 2.4L petrol engine in a 20 year old car... its not going to be by any means economical as is, never mind with a remap.

Get yourself the number plate instead, forget the remap. :regular_smile:

Ha, a 20 year old diesel wagon with "JB 007" number plates.

lol that would be cool but I shudder to think how much..

no I'm thinking of one with STU on it

i wanted BW51 YOB but the missus said no

update after actually doing a long run without heavy load + nothing on the roof (i.e. in standard conditions.. with roof bars on, too lazy to take off)

120miles of A road
50 miles Urban
total average 26mpg
not being shy with throttle either

latest urban-only is 21.5mpg

brings yearly rolling average up to just over 20mpg for the first time

so it's definitely not great around town (shocker) but fine on long runs where the costs would usually be more of a consideration

I collected my T5 in October 2001, and have logged all the petrol used.
At each fill of fuel, the car gauges are reset.
Worst has been when towing a trailer loaded with sleepers 19.02 (Car stated 21.30)
Best has been 38.56. Car stated 38.60
According to the car, it's best was 40.1 at average speed of 49mph.
The instant fuel readout is interesting, the lowest I've seen it when using kickdown is about 8mpg.
The calculated MPG is 27.81, over the 97,000 miles to date.

LPG for ME
 

he he on a fairly fast {but mostly legal} motorway trip to Penrith and back {200 RTM's} my V70R AWD did 36MPG on LPG at 57ppl just about 85MPG on Petrol

The long trip reading looks like it's gonna be promising, I went all the way to the lake district this week on about £50 which is ludicrous compared to the usual urban readings

I'll update when i get back tomorrow but it will include all the driving about up and down hills etc and pottering about town while here, still I'm optimistic

Lately due to good weather I've basically relegated the car to the long drives only and biked to and from work which belive it or not is on average 3 minutes faster.. and is getting rid of the fat bastard lockdown pizza belly

Actual update, now I'm home..

Lake District and back, literally as fully loaded as it's possible to be, including a BIG roof bag and stuff in every footwell - 600miles of motorway (definitely 'not' doing a lot of 80-90 mph) plus the driving around the lanes for a week.. and we got stuck in about an hours worth of slow traffic on the way home

real-world calculated economy 28.4mpg for the whole trip which actually I'm pretty impressed with tbh

it sounds like you do yours pretty accurately so that's an interesting point of comparison, what are your 'usual' drives - do you do more stop/start traffic, or a lot of A roads, etc

the instantaneous mpg gauge in my old BM's used to make me chuckle as well, put your foot down and the needle disappears off the bottom of the chart, like 5mpg or something who knows

One of the benefits of being retired is that times of travel can be chosen, so stop/start motoring can generally be avoided. I try and use for long journeys only, motorways/A roads. It's only when 'long' items have to be collected, is it used locally.
It's very handy having the hybrid Yaris for the shops, as that only uses a couple of pints per week..