A friend of mine asked a question to me that I have no idea of answering so I thought I would ask on here to see what options are available to him.
He runs a private hire company with about 50 drivers and 25 cars most are Vauxhall astra 1.7 tdi?s, now with the economic down turn he wants to reduce his costs and one of his biggest costs is fuel (even with the price going down) as he hires his vehicles out to drivers he knows most don?t driver them the way they should i.e. going to 3 ? 5 revs before gear change, is their any effective method (legal) to reduce or limit the revs a vehicle goes to, a few people have told me you can get them governed , restricted etc but I have no idea how to etc, so I would look like a twit telling him to get so and so done if I don?t know what it is my self. Also what revs does a mot tester require the vehicle to be on when testing its emissions.
Thanks guys for any feedback.
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all buses and lorries are restricted so it must be fiesable they also have to have a test cert
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The cost of fitting would far outweigh any possible savings, and the insurance company would have to be told as it's a modification. I doubt it's even worth thinking about.
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Getting someone in to teach them how to drive a diesel properly would probably be more effective! Revving them 3-5k rpm, why???!
Do the drivers pay for the fuel or is it him? If its him then the obvious thing is to change it so they do... or put a stipulation in the contract that they do a minimum of, say, 40mpg or they invoke a penalty clause?
Its surprising just how many people still don't know how to drive their diesel economically, including many "professional" drivers... though to be fair some of the drivers we use are really good and sympathetic towards their cars.
Re the revs for emmission testing - isn't that up to the rev limiter for a diesel?
Edited by b308 on 05/01/2009 at 11:05
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Might sound a bit drastic but the last time I drove a car that had restriction on performance, it was because the air intake had been crushed.
Could you reduce BHP doing that? Im not saying it will improve economy but will sure slow them down!
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Educate, don't legislate!
Put all the drivers on an advanced driving course of some kind. Keep league tables of "incidents" and fuel consumption and at the end of a year drivers who have done particularly well get a gold star, i.e. move up to a higher grade car.
Alternatives:
"How am I driving?" stickers.
Fit a GPS based "tracker", to monitor travel, speed, etc.
Take cars away and make them all drive LGVs with tachographs fitted.
If all else fails, shove a potato in the exhaust !
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We had some vans at work which were restricted by too much slack in the throttle cable, maybe inadvertently. They were dangerous. Imagine having to pull out onto a de-restricted road from stationary when you've only got half throttle?
I. erm, re-adjusted them.
Edit: I wasn't moving, not buying paper.
Edited by bathtub tom on 05/01/2009 at 14:28
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Pay them 10p per mile and make them fill the tank
10p per mile gives roughly 45mpg - easily achieved - if they get more than 45mpg then they have a bonus - less than 45mpg tell them to ease off the throttle.
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I think them paying for their own fuel is the best answer. Every hire car I have ever had has always come with either an empty tank or a full tank. You return it in the same condition. Its amazing how peoples attitude changes when they have to pay out of their back pocket.
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It's technically easy I'm sure as it's only a value in the ECU, whether it's re-programmable or not is a different matter.
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