Hi there, i have a 1997 mercedes sprinter luton with tail lift 310d 2.9 turbo deisel and ive worked out that the miles to gallon is 24.47! is this right as i thought they were supposed to be really economical i.e. 35 miles to the gallon. can anyone shed any light on this please, thanks
slt
Edited by Pugugly on 12/12/2008 at 17:51
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Are the mpg figures specifically for a Luton?, or just for a normal Sprinter?
The drag caused by both the extra frontal area, and the aerodynamically awkward shape will mean that the fuel consumption will really suffer when you travel quickly.
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i used the mpg calculator in the internet to work out what it was doing, and that figure of 24.47 is what it came back with and i was curious to know what it is supposed to do?
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i thought they were supposed to be really economical i.e. 35 miles to the gallon.
This is the figure I was asking about, is 35 mpg the figure for an ordinary van, or a luton - I had trusted that you had done something sensible to estimate your actual mpg figures of about 25 mpg, and you weren't relying on an onboard mpg readout.
For a luton van ~25 mpg doesn't sound ridiculously poor.
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In my limited experience of diesel vans and their fuel economy I have found that to get the best out of a van you have to travel at sensible speeds and not thrash the living daylights out of them. This seems to have a dramatic effect on the fuel economy. If I travel down a motorway in a van at a sensible pace eg 70mph then the economy is reasonable. Push that speed nearer to 90mph and you can almost see the fuel guage needle dropping as you travel! Well you get the general idea.
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yesterday i travelled 107.04 miles and it used up 20 quids worth of deisel, i didnt go more than 70 mph on motorway mostly 60 mph, i heard that the actual vans not lutons were capable of 40+ mpg which is why i expected this one to do around the 30 mpg mark, i have only had the luton a week and dont think it has been serviced for a while, is there anything i can do to make it more economical?
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>>is there anything i can do to make it more economical?
Make sure your tyre pressures are correct, and that your brakes are not binding.
Make sure the engine is well serviced, with the correct viscosity grade of oil (also make sure it meets the relevant MB specifications)
Reduce your top speed - even a small reduction will make a big difference.
Avoid driving in traffic, and, if you do, switch off instead of idling for more than a minute or so.
When in traffic, use good anticipation to avoid throwing away your vehicle's momentum - although you don't actually use fuel while braking, it's during the period when you accelerate back up to speed that your fuel is lost.
If the front of the Luton body is fully square, and you do a lot of motorway or higher speed driving as opposed to city centre multi-drop work consider an aerodynamic fairing to reduce drag. Even making the sharp corners radiussed will give a noticeable saving.
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it already has the fairing on top of the cab, have noticed that one of the front tyres needs changing, have not checked pressures as yet
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Wear on the tyres is not so much of a issue, as long as the pressure is set correct.
I think that you should do some proper calculations based over a few tankfuls of diesel before you start looking for problems that may or may not exist. They way I read your post is that you are basing this mpg average on sticking £20 in the tank and then driving 107 miles.
You really need to brim the tank full, reset the trip on the odometer and use the whole tankful of diesel before filling it to the brim again and look how many miles you did on it. That will give you a truer mpg figure. Repeat it a couple of times, take the averages and the more you do it the more acurate your actual figure will become.
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no i used the internet mpg calculator
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As NC says,25mpg is not bad for a Luton.
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would like to better that though
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