thsi has bugged me for ages. Wife has a 2.5 yr old CMax 1.8 petrol Zetec. Now she isn't the best at optimum gearchaging and driving economically, although in her defense she normally has 2 small kids in the back. Mileage is house/school/childminder/work etc, so lots of short trips and use of heater/screen demisters/ac etc. economy seems to average around 27mpg. If we take it on a long trip (not often as it's the second car) and i drive it sensibly it can get up to high 30s.
so is this normal - I guess I have always expected a bit better.
Annual mileage around 6K
Thanks
Sounds reasonable. Short trips are really bad for economy. And the car.
come on now, it's a c-max, it's a brick on wheels. Admittely my 10 year old 1.8 focus isn't hugely better but then it is 10 years old.
LOL, it's much less of a brick than the Scenic it replaced 😆it's a brick on wheels
anyway, bricks are aerodynamic at sub 30mph !
17 miles up the A130/A127 (PITA road, up to 70, slow to a halt, up to 70slow to a halt again and again) gets me about 36mpg in my 1.8 Focus.
Not a million miles away from my old 1.2 Fiesta to be honest (got about 38-40mpg on the same journey)
Yeah probably not much more than 25mpg for me driving through bristol each day, 8 miles each way.
An engine decoke, flush would help but not by much.
Think of it this way. If you are thinking 'hey I can get a zippy run around with 40mpg+ instead' its a massive false economy in your case.
Cost of change (the amount your car is worth at trade in), the cost of the car versus 6k mileage a year versus what you'd need to make up to make the diff in mpg versus cost lost....
For 6,000m's a year I'd live with 27mpg.
hora - decoke/flush surely not rqd on a 2.5yr old car with 20K miles on it ? I does get a bit of stick on occasion if I am driving it , but that's usually only on the way to the filling station 🙄
edit just seen your next post.
Didnt know it was that young!
What do the average and urban official figures say? Could plug into the ECU and see if any faults....
OR.... you drive it for a couple of days and just see if its her driving style.
Got a '57 plate 1.8 focus and getting pretty much the same figures.
Although I do have bars and a thule rack on the roof.
a zippy run around with 40mpg+
I dunno if such a thing exists for the type of use that we need from a second car anyway. I reackon the quoted mpg's are way out vs. many people's driving situations anyway. Our other car is a 2010 diesel that 'should' do something over 50mpg combined and it averages 41.5, with a lot of slow town driving etc, and that's even with 'efficient dynamics, stop start' etc
Jeez! My mk2 Escort did about the same mpg!
My 10 year old 2.5 V6 does about the same mileage as your 1.8.. Something doesnt add up! lol
Both were used for short journeys too.
Milkie - it has been on the Ford diagnostics twice and they say nowt wrong with it.
Looking at some of the other responses I guess it's most likley down to the type and style of driving/journeys though
I reackon the quoted mpg's are way out vs. many people's driving situations anyway
Depends on the car. We get close to the advertised figures. When averaged over town and country, we tend to get the combined. On the open road we can get somewhat less than the extra-urban figure, and around town it's reasonably accurate too.
Although that's only in the summer. It goes down in winter.
Got a '57 plate 1.8 focus and getting pretty much the same figures.
😯
You know, you should really go above 3rd gear sometimes 😆
Doesn't sound right I average about 26-27 in the Leon!
Could be something as daft as the trip computer being a bit inaccurate
rich - Fi drives at about 1/4 of your average speed too 😆
i used to get 30 from the Golf !!
Our old Mondeo used to average 28mpg and around the 33mpg mark on a good run. That was with the old 1.8 duratec engine.
06 Focus LX 1.6 Petrol - mid to high 30s mpg driving around town and country
09 Mondeo Zetec 2.0 Diesel - mid to high 30s mpg doing the same driving.
Your figures sound maybe a little low but reasonable enough to me.
Sounds about right to me.
There's a lot of fanciful claims when it comes to MPG.
My sis-in-law claims 37mpg from her 2.4 ton Korean 4x4 while towing a 1.5 ton caravan.
A chap at work used to have to regularly drain away the excess from the tank of his V6 Calibra. It produced so much petrol.
The best one was a contractor at work. A right ****. Claimed his TDCi Focus was doing nearly 100mpg.
Some people look at their best ever figure, or a figure they often see on the instant readout, and claim that's their mpg.
Although, the ecotec focus driven at 56mph with the lorries on a motorway might well be in the 90s mpg-wise.
09 Mondeo Zetec 2.0 Diesel - mid to high 30s mpg doing the same driving.
Have a look at your driving style or take that back to the shop. My 2.0 TDi Passat gives 45-55mpg depending on the roads being driven. Your mondy should be doing similar.
thanks all - sounds like it is as much as can be expected given the short trips/type of driving etc
In TDI's I always beat the mpg- I think its because of the way you drive certain engines (ride the torque etc correctly).
Petrol though- NO WHERE near. I really don't drive petrols properly. Maybe I'm a dieselman deep down 🙁
Have a look at your driving style
Nah, no need, I know perfectly well why it's where it is and how to increase it, thanks 😉
My 05 plate 1.8 Mondeo gets circa 33-34mpg. I can get it up to 38mpg if being anal.
My car which is probably slightly bigger than a Mondeo returns a combined mileage of 55-60mpg, but i avoid town driving as much as possible and make my longer journeys at quiet times (65mpg easily achieved on a run).
I could put my wife behind the wheel and she'd shave 20% off that. My mum would do the same, but they aren't fast drivers.
I'd say the problem is a combination of driving style and the nature of short stop start journeys in town. Town driving fuel performance is affected much more greatly by the driving style as driving efficiently becomes very much more challenging in this environment, but even the best drivers will still use up a lot more fuel per mile.
You must be flooring it everywhere!
Hora -
You know, you should really go above 3rd gear sometimes
Funnily enough my science teacher used to say that to me too!
molgrips - Member
You must be flooring it everywhere!
Not really - at least not boy racer style. Town driving just kills mpg no matter what most people will claim when trying to say how great their cars are on mpg.
It does, yes. You said a mix tho. I only get high 30s if I really am stuck in traffic, it soon picks up when I hit the motorway.
I've been tracking the fuel economy on our focus tdci and its averaging 56mpg over 2000 miles. It only takes about an hour of London driving to drop the economy to 45mpg though. Long motorway driving gets it up over 60mpg though which is much better (except for the driving bit).
We have a 54 plate 1.8 c-max petrol. It is shit on fuel consumption!!!
We cannot get any better than 30mpg, even on a run. It is extremely low geared for a modern car. My P registered Volvo 850 estate car, fully laden with camping gear returned 40mpg average over 2000 miles from Notts to Arcachon and back.
Speed for speed back to back testing of both car, and the volvo's RPM are a good 800 less per gear. Basically, to get anywhere, the C-max is revving its tits off.
The wife's 1.8 C-Max petrol averages 34mpg. Mix of driving - short distances to the normal 15 mile town/country commute.
Agree that it's very low geared.
Paul
My Forester was like that but then its designed for higher revs naturally in many applications. Wierd on a CMax though. Could this be due to the load weight of the car and the designers decided to lift the revs to try and give the 1.8 version abit more pep?Basically, to get anywhere, the C-max is revving its tits off.
My Forester was like that but then its designed for higher revs naturally in many applications
Did you have it stuck in low range? 🙂
Our old Mondeo used to average 28mpg and around the 33mpg mark on a good run. That was with the old 1.8 duratec engine.
I average 37mpg overall in a 1.8 '91 Mondeo, but don't often take it over 3000rpm unless I'm on a longer trip. I get around 40mpg on a run, but I do tend to drive a bit faster where it makes a difference to the journey time so that offsets some of the gain you would otherwise expect.
My experience of Ford cars is that I always get -10% from what they claim as the 'overall' figure, the exception was my 1.7 Puma which did 41 mpg at all times !
I (we) have 2 diesel Fiestas now, 1.4tdci £35/yr tax 60mpg, and an Econetic 1.6tdci £0/yr tax 70mpg, but it did cost over £10k !
You pays your money ......
My 1.7 puma does 40mpg or so except when it slow moving traffic when it drops to about 25mpg. Planning to get a c-max and think a diesel might be sensible; like the look of the new one that's coming out but suspect I'll get a 2nd hand outgoing version.
I'd say definitely diesel for anything large or heavy, otherwise you'll need a massive engine and fuel bills to match, or be revving the tits off it all the time.
average 37mpg overall in a 1.8 '91 Mondeo,
Im guessing a typo here as the Mondeo didnt come out until 1993...
I used to get that sort of figure in my Golf GTI, and that was never driven 'conservatively'...
Im guessing a typo here as the Mondeo didnt come out until 1993...
More of a brain fade - I meant 2001!