Most Efficient Driving Method for MPG on XC60 T6

[JamesN7]

In the middle of the fuel crisis I had to do a ~100 mile return journey, followed by a ~280 mile return journey a couple of days later, not knowing if I'd be able to fill up. The car was initially showing a range of 280 miles (MY18 S90 T8, so 50l tank), which was worrying, but the tank was nearly full and I was confident that it was underestimating a fair bit based on the few short journeys done since full tank reset.

Within a few miles the estimate had increased to about ~380 It was going to be tight.

So the first journey leg was driven with extreme caution. I was able to start fully charged, and fully charge for the return trip - it worked out to 52 miles each way. About half motorway, half fast A-road. The return was late in the day, so we probably used a little more fuel in the aux heater.

The trip up averaged 80.3mpg - a new personal best Can anyone beat that over ~50 miles? (The app trip log records it as ~90mpg - excluding aux heater fuel use?)

I left it in Hybrid mode, and stuck to the speed limits (like normal ), and more like 60-65mph on dual carriageways. No harsh acceleration - avoid ever using kickdown if you can. You also have to make every possible use of regen - especially light regen off-throttle in D or B-mode - by anticipating the roads and traffic ahead to ensure you don't need to brake (but still regen) until the last ~100 yards, and then only use the actual brakes for the final stop.

I've played around with Hold and Charge mode a bit, but I'm not convinced there is much if any efficiency benefit in using them unless you want to run silent/clean later.

The trip back was more like 70mpg - still respectable - and the longer journey (mostly busy motorways) more like 50-60mpg, again charging at each end. (We managed to fill up during the final leg home, but I reckon we would have made it back!)

If you don't put in the above effort and just go with the flow / drive normally, I find longer journeys tend to gravitate towards about 40mpg (but closer to 50mpg if there's traffic). Even a very brief bit of enthusiastic driving can send it nose-diving though.

For your journey length you probably won't have to worry about it too much - especially if you can charge at each end. If you have the aux heater (on) you'll use a bit when it's cold, but you can turn it off. When it's proper cold though, leaving it on is probably helping you to get more out of cold batteries, and waste less on heated seats/steering wheel. It does lead to some comedy moments on pure electric journeys with a chilly start though, where you can get 999mpg for a while

James