Some great points being made here.
Lorries are just the same, we get new lorries regularly, they have a 5 year life with us then go back, each and every new model has more gadgetry and electronics and driving aids supposed to make them so much more economical than the last one that didn't have quite so much (to go wrong), ''this ones the business'', ''they've sorted the engine out on the new model, this ones superb'' we hear it all, these new ones will do 11 mpg on our work, as if, no they jolly well won't, and we just smile and wait till we've done a few regular trips with them on the long uphill drags that feature on much of our work.
Result being exactly as said above, for all the new technology the simple fact is that fuel has to be burned to shift 44 tons of lorry up hill and around hundreds of junctions, and when after a few weeks we find, lo and behold, the new one is doing if not worse (given euro 6 strangulation) then about the same as the old one was and the one before that..which went better too cos it wasn't stranged with emission stuff so kept in top gear longer...and the one before that, and before you know it you're back in the 90's and the vehicles were still giving around the same fuel economy as today because despite not being as technically efficient they breathed easier, plus other reasons i won't bore you further with.
Cars are much more economical today but only if everything is perfect as on a fuel economy test bed, but when variables come into it you're still back to burning fuel to get up to and maintian speed, and on ever heavier cars with ever fatter tyres, you have to ask yourself is this feasable.
Note well designed hybrids are the ones able to reap better economy when the variables such as traffic and stop start combine, and they always sit on sensible tyres, they take advantage of the conditions that penalise heavily the cars that can be ultimately more economical at a steady cruise if carefully driven.
I think you have to use some common sense when reading these economy figures, if you're standing beside a massive car half filling a showroom and weighing in at near on two tons sat on tyres and wheels that wouldn't look out of place on a lorry, then you have to ask yourself seriously is this car really capable of 60mpg in normal driving.
Should be an interesting conversation at the Audi showroom, i'd like to be a fly on the wall.
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