Fuel Consumption

[johnyc]

Hi All, looking for some help. I am a avid landrover fan, i have always had at least one since the age of 11. My father was always a fan but he unfortunately passed away last november. When he died we persuaded my mother to sell his range rover and discovery and buy a freelander. She bought a 54 plate 5 door sport. the problem is she is only getting 350 miles to a full tank of fuel. when she stops on her drive she says she can smell diesel however there is no leaks evident. has anyone had the same problem?

many thanks

john

[Jonners]

Hi Johnyc,

I don't entirely believe some of the fuel figures bandied around, but I feel 350 miles on a tank full on a TD4 should be more like 400 miles. Mine uses quite a lot of fuel around town but achieves 37 to 40mpg on a motorway run from Cheltenham to Devon.

Regarding the diesel smell, my TD4 was the same when I bought it, but cleaning up all the pipes aroung the engine (covered in oil mist) seemed to get rid of it.

Obvious mileage problems could be the need to replace the MAF ( seems a common problem at about 50,000 miles or so) or simply a clean up of of the EGR - perhaps even replacing it with a blanking kit, plus a clean up inside all the EGR hoses, new air filter etc.

Hope this works - Jonners

[tim_roberts]

"350 miles on a tank full" really doesn't mean a lot as some people run their tanks lower than others!

You have to do a bit of maths to convert litres to gallons, then divide by miles to get the mpg.

In my L-series diesel I get 38-40mpg on motorway journeys, but considerably less than that running around town. Diesels don't like stop-go driving especially when cold.

Mine had a faint smell of diesel for several months, which I couldn't trace, then one day diesel started pouring onto the road and I had to do something about it. It turned out the little rubber tubes that take the excess fuel away from the injectors were leaking badly. I bought 1 metre of tubing from my local car shop and replaced the lot - easy job. Not sure if the TD4 has similar tubing or metal pipewrok, but worth checking.

[Tanuki]

What's her driving-pattern? Lots of short urban low-speed journeys will give lower MPG than a few long-distance open-road trips.

Is it an auto or a manual? Contrary to popular opinion I've found that autos are significantly better in the fuel economy game in low-speed/urban situations.