C202 250td how many miles on a tankfull?

[Orlando 300E]

Hello all,
It’s been quite a while since my last post...
I killed my 300E & have replaced it with a C202 250td Elegance.
I should change my user name but don’t want to make the drop to junior member!

The C has now done 126k miles, I have put 11k on it since I got it. The servicing is up to date; I have done the oil & filter change, both fuel filters in the engine bay, air filter and just recently changed all the glow plugs.

Any way, my question is how many miles should I be getting out of a tank full, the best I have had once is 350 miles, with around 320 the norm -all on a mixed bag of city motorway and main roads. I mostly now only do short town driving and I get 300.

By my calculations I am getting around 25 miles to the gallon;
Funnily enough that was what I would get in my 300E with the added bonus of-
Better performance, throttle response, cheaper unleaded fuel & Space!

I will say that the best thing about the C is the electronic 5 speed gearbox. It makes the car as quick on twisty B roads as the E ever was.

So is this it, should I live with this poor consumption or is there something fundamentally wrong with my Mercedes?
Cheers in advance
Orlando

 

[Blobcat]

Hello all,
I will say that the best thing about the C is the electronic 5 speed gearbox. It makes the car as quick on twisty B roads as the E ever was.
Orlando

That may explain some of your low fuel economy.
25mpg does seem low though. How is it running & have you had an MOT emissions test done?

 

[hexflyer]

i'm gettin 450-500miles out of my 250TD on a mix of motorway and town wk, and i don't hang about either average 80 on motorways sometimes 85mph

 

[jberks]

You really can't compare one with another. Simply check the car is running correctly in terms of emmissions and you have your answer. I could come on here and say I get 500 miles, but not mention that I live in rural Lincolnshire (no hills and minimal traffic) and do most of my driving outside rush hour. You get 320 but live in Edinburgh (a mountainous and busy congested capital city).
As I have often said on here. I got 42.5mpg reported on the way to work this morning. The journey out of Leeds is a steady run down quiet (6:30am) main roads and dual carriageways so I can usually maintain 45-50 and then a steady run over the M62 at 60-90 followed by another steady run into Manchester on a well designed dual carriageway so no hold ups. It would be better but I have to climb over the pennines so lots of up-hills. However, on the way home, whilst I can often see 42 as I get off the motorway, by the time I've queued accelerated and queued for 35 mins to get through rush hour congestion in Leeds (the same journey that took 10 mins that morning), I often see only 36 reported. If I then do a bit dropping off and picking up, it could be showing 33 or less. It all has far more to do with how long you spend in traffic, how hard you accelerate, inc steady but up hill (Edinburgh!) and how much time spent stationary. 25mpg round town is not unusual. Home to the shops and back, my computer shows 23 which I consider good compared to the 16 I used to get out of my E240!

 

[Cooky]

My mpg is very similar to Orlando's. When the car is used for mixed driving it returns about 32mpg, but will do about 38-39mpg on a long motorway run.

Currently, my wife uses the car for work; this means a daily return journey of 6 miles, and with little open road driving the car is returning about 25mpg. This is not city driving and the traffic could not be called "heavy".

All in all I think this is about right. It's good on long motorway runs because at a constant 2500rpm or so there is not much slip in the torque converter (these cars don't have torque converter lock-up), whereas shorter journeys with lots of corners and speed changes causes a fair bit of torque converter slip - and a resultant hit on fuel consumption.

When towing a 1460kg caravan (long haul) I get about 20mpg. I think this is reasonable for an automatic with a gross train weight of about 3.3 tonnes.

One thing interests me; does the Ehaust Gas Recirculation (EGR) valve have an effect on fuel consumption? When I ran older Citroen/Peugeot turbo diesels (before the days of common rail injection) it was commonly said that disabling the EGR would improve mpg, but I've never tried it. Does anyone know?
Cheers

 

[Orlando 300E]

Cheers for the replies guys.

Blobcat-
As far as emissions, it was MOTd was last September, the form stapled to the test slip says that the Opacity mean value of 0.40.
Its running fine, cold starts were a bit tractor like with the 2 glow plugs away -but that’s now fixed.
BTW how is Carmarthen -used to stay near Llandeilo!

Hexflyer-
You lucky person, If I was getting that I would be very happy.
I could tell my mate with his A4 1.9 tdi where to go!

jberks-
I know what you mean about hills & poor roads in Edinburgh, I voted against the congestion charge, but that’s another story.
I don’t also don't drive in the rush hour & conveniently everything is east west avoiding the worst of the hills.
But I was getting 320-330 running all over the country; Preston, Newcastle, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Thurso, Wick etc. etc.

Cooky-
It’s reassuring to hear you can reproduce this figure, but mines never done anything near yours on long runs.

Cheers
Orlando

 

[Blobcat]

Cheers for the replies guys.

Blobcat-

BTW how is Carmarthen -used to stay near Llandeilo!

Cheers
Orlando

I can say that Carmarthen is very nice and sunny today. Been on the Bike to North Wales and back last couple of days. Really nice roads, great weather and very little traffic. What a difference from a car to a bike.