Audi A4 Avant 2.0tdi Quattro (170) Fuel economy

[discobarry]

Hello all, I've just recently bought one of these A4's and i seem to be experiencing poor fuel economy...I am going to check a few things over but i'm wondering what others with the same car get?

On average ours 35mpg, but coming home on an hours solid motorway driving tonight it seemed to be at 30mpg maximum.

Now the car has always been serviced with Audi but i don't know what there servicing entails, So i think i'll service the engine myself and i have 4 snow tyres on which i know will give a greater rolling resistance.

So just wondering what you all think, Thanks.

[Dumbledore6]

I have the same care and average 35.6mpg, quite sh*t for a diesel isn't it, but I still love my car.

Dave.

[allanmb]

Hello all, I've just recently bought one of these A4's and i seem to be experiencing poor fuel economy...I am going to check a few things over but i'm wondering what others with the same car get?

On average ours 35mpg, but coming home on an hours solid motorway driving tonight it seemed to be at 30mpg maximum.

Now the car has always been serviced with Audi but i don't know what there servicing entails, So i think i'll service the engine myself and i have 4 snow tyres on which i know will give a greater rolling resistance.

So just wondering what you all think, Thanks.

30mpg? That's very low, I get that with my 3.2 petrol!

[Marky67]

Slightly better with 36.5mpg!!! But mine is the 2.0tdi 170 Quattro Saloon.
Agree.... not good for a diesel...... but love the car.

[Puresilk]

Damn!

I always regretted not getting a 2.0 tdi 170 S line Quattro

I bought the 2.0 tdi 140 S line instead remapped it to 170 bhp and now get average of between 50 - 55 mpg depending on my right foot!

BUT still wished I had the QUATTRO!

[SebRogers]

IME you can only really get a sense of a car's fuel economy over several tankfuls and working it out yourself (brim to brim) rather than relying on the DIS. So if the car's new to you I wouldn't panic just yet. Having said that, the 170 quattro is comparatively thirsty. Mine averages a genuine 40mpg over mixed driving (measured over the last 6000 miles), but I've noticed that it's affected quite badly by stop/start traffic and general town / B road use, where I generally get closer to low-mid 30s.

I didn't buy it for the economy though :D

[looney]

Same car as yours 36mpg

[discobarry]

The ironic thing is, it doesn't seem so bad locally it's when i get on the motorways and at worst i do 80mph generally very steadily all the way.

It's always been serviced by Audi but i don't know what an audi 'service' entails?

[SebRogers]

Oil and filters will be the main thing, same as any other car.

When I bought mine the DIS showed the previous owner had averaged 34.5mpg. It now reads 39.0 mpg, after 4 months. Same car, different driving styles.

It'll never be great but you should be getting better than 30mpg. I'd live with it a while to see how things average out...

[Marky67]

Discobarry; Something is wrong... My commute to work is just over 20 miles each way 90% motorway (ave speed on motorway 85-90) + 5 miles local roads.
As I said earlier..... I average 36.5mpg (calculated tank to tank)..... the more motorway miles I do, the closer to 40mpg.

Interesting point I noted was that when I had all my injectors replaced FOC by Audi..... the ave mpg increased from 34 to 36.5.
Have yours been replaced / checked yet?

[mikeybutch]

Its always worth checking the air filter.Garages cant be trusted to change these when servicing and if it is old and dirty it will restrict the air flow especially cruising at speed and the mpg will suffer .Also I think you can replace with high perf ones which improve performance.Until recently I had a 2.5tdi Quattro which easily gave over 40 cruising at 70/80 and now have the same but Tiptronic which isclose to 40 in similar mode

[discobarry]

Thanks for the replies, The injectors we're done a few months ago by Audi themselves, it has full Audi service history and it is fairly low mileage.

I think the snow tyres could play a slight factor in it all but i'm going to see how i get on and check the air filter at the least.

[CrispyL]

I get around 36 to 40mph, I've had it averaging around 44mpg up the A1 before. Looking at getting it mapped as it is supposed to improve the drive, eliminate flat spots and improve MPG. Engine power increases to 204BHP and 420lb ft torque.

What year / plate are your cars that have had injectors replaced? mines a 2007, 57?

[Marky67]

What year / plate are your cars that have had injectors replaced? mines a 2007, 57?
June 2007 07 plate. Had 2 injectors replaced under warranty 18 moths ago..... then all 4 replaced with new design 3 months ago.
Car at 60k mileage

[discobarry]

2007 and replaced 4months ago ish.

[CrispyL]

2007 and replaced 4months ago ish.

Is yours an 07 or a 57 plate? what were the symptoms of needing new injectors please?

[JimC64]

2.0 Tdi 140 remapped to 176 currently getting around 37.1 mpg and thats stop / start around town now. I used to do mostly motorway miles but with a good mix I could expect to see around 44mpg with the best ever being 52.1mpg although I think over time / miles I could have seen higer 50's mpg, if driven a little more conservatively.

[discobarry]

Is yours an 07 or a 57 plate? what were the symptoms of needing new injectors please?

I haven't had it long, the guy who had it said it just wouldn't start one day, Audi did it under warranty as it has full service history with them. And it's an 07.

[discobarry]

....Well i'm pretty sure it's ok now, The car has a FSH from Audi but i thought to myself what do Audi actually do for several hundred pounds? Not a lot it seems, i took the air intakes off the air filter and looked into the air filter box and i saw a very dark filter full of crap, so i took it the whole way out and it was disgusting and the air filter box itself was full of crap too.

I fitted that up and then moved onto the fuel filter, which was full of very dark watery diesel, i've never seen one like it in my thousands of filters i've changed! I finished that off and changed the treacle....sorry oil and the filter which was literally falling in bits in it's housing.

I drove it afterwards and it feels smoother and the local mpg is a lot better so i'll see what its like on the motorways this weekend!

I feel for the bloke who has been paying what....£400? for a service each time and hasn't been getting much other than a vac out and wash.

[Puresilk]

Audi change the air filter every 60k, fuel filter every 40k, pollen filter 20k, which is too long IMHO !

[Y90USF]

170bhp fwd after all the work audi have recently done I'm getting mod 40s on the motorway which im happy about

[20vcqdriver]

I get around 36 to 40mph, I've had it averaging around 44mpg up the A1 before. Looking at getting it mapped as it is supposed to improve the drive, eliminate flat spots and improve MPG. Engine power increases to 204BHP and 420lb ft torque.

What year / plate are your cars that have had injectors replaced? mines a 2007, 57?

Think you mean 320Lb/ft... 420 is the figure I get out of my chipped 3Tdi which averages 35mpg coming to work on mixed dual carriageway and town driving with 41mpg possible on a decent motorway run. Start getting stuck in a lot of stop start traffic though and it soon drops into the high 20's..:boggled:

[discobarry]

Hmmm still poor fuel economy, After servicing it was a lot smoother and it generally drove better but fuel economy has only slightly improved to 36.5 on a motorway run.

The guy who had it before me who i'm still in touch with says it did mid 40's most of the time especially on runs which makes no sense, he is either fibbing or something is a miss.

The injectors have been replaced and all the fuel lines/pumps etc some time back as Audi messed something up on the latter apparently.

What do do?

[SebRogers]

Hmmm still poor fuel economy, After servicing it was a lot smoother and it generally drove better but fuel economy has only slightly improved to 36.5 on a motorway run.

The guy who had it before me who i'm still in touch with says it did mid 40's most of the time especially on runs which makes no sense, he is either fibbing or something is a miss.


Mid 40s most of the time is a bit ambitious unless he's got a really light right foot :D

Mine will do anything from high 30s to mid 40s on a motorway run, depending on how hilly the route is and whether there's a headwind or not (I'm not kidding). BUT I rarely drive over 70. I would expect those figures to drop if I was keeping up with outside lane traffic at, say 80-85. Although 36.5 doesn't sound great, I think a lot still depends on how heavy your right foot is.

I don't know whether a duff temp sender (for example) might affect fuelling - there are others on here with a far better understanding of how these engines work who might be able to help with that.

Good luck!

[allanmb]

Speed will be a big factor. If I drive at 60 I get about 34mpg, at 70 I get around 31mpg and at 80 I get about 28mpg.

Also, what tyre pressures are you running? I run 38psi on my 18" wheels...

[Puresilk]

Thats quite poor economy, I have read threads on the A5 3.0 Tdi and people state that they get over 40 MPG and thats a 240 BHP car and quattro, so why is the 2.0 Tdi 170 quattro so poor?

[SebRogers]

Thats quite poor economy, I have read threads on the A5 3.0 Tdi and people state that they get over 40 MPG and thats a 240 BHP car and quattro, so why is the 2.0 Tdi 170 quattro so poor?

Because the A5 is based on the B8 platform and its 3.0tdi is, AFAIK, a much newer unit. VAG's diesels have become a lot more fuel efficient in the past 2-3 years. The 170pd engine on the B7 2.0tdi quattro is an older design and the official combined cycle figure is around 41mpg. The current B8 2.0tdi quattro with common rail has a combined cycle figure pretty close to 50mpg, I think.

In short, you're comparing apples with oranges ;)

[Puresilk]

Hi Seb

I guess I was naiave to that, your right different technology more advancement in fuel consumption, as im sure I have read somewhere the new A5 3.0 tdi is close to achieving 50 MPG!

[cornwallman]

Interesting thread. I'm looking for a an A4 2.0 petrol Avant quattro with under 50k on the clock, 2008 or newer in case anyone decides their fuel consumption is too great!

Edited to a petrol one after having trouble with my Golf which has DPF and doesn't like "short" journeys. Commute of 9 miles, 6 miles main road and virtually no traffic.

What has happened to tdi's ? DPf killed them imo.

[CrispyL]

Interesting thread. I'm looking for a an A4 2.0 tdi Avant quattro with under 50k on the clock, 2007 or newer in case anyone decides their fuel consumption is too great!

My A4 Avant Special Edition Quattro is for sale....

[adrian mick]

i have a 2.0 tdi quattro 170 really nice car but she is heavy on fuel did all the filters etc no diff getting 34.9mpg every tank which is mostly town driving. was on the motorway the other night doing 80mph and the computer was reading 38.9mpg on average. i'm thinking of getting her remapped and the pdf out as the town driving is going to cause me problems in the future. also thinking of getting the air intake pipes replaced with the improved ones anybody have this done is it worth it???

[gavinl1967]

I bought my 2007 2.0 Tdi quattro 170 back in December. I've just returned from a week away in Yorkshire (from Glasgow). On board were 2 adults, 1 teenager, an 8 year old and the boot was crammed full to within an inch of its life. The round trip was 510 miles, perhaps 400 of which were motorway miles. I didn't calculate the mpg, but the DIS indicated mpg for the trip was 40.6. Even with a 5% DIS error that would give a returned mpg of around 37ish. I thought that was pretty good!

[Splash]

Thats quite poor economy, I have read threads on the A5 3.0 Tdi and people state that they get over 40 MPG and thats a 240 BHP car and quattro, so why is the 2.0 Tdi 170 quattro so poor?

Amazes me that I can get over 40 in my A6 3.0 TDI allroad, which is not only quattro, but I'm also running it on offroad tyres. DIS was actually showing 40.9 over 200 motorway miles trying to keep at 80 where possible.

[Petemate]

All the above very intriguing. I run a Saab 1.9Tid 150 Sportwagon. With the fuelling standard, and on summer tyres, I was getting average of 45-47 actual (brim-brim checks, computor he says 47-40 lol) Winter of 2006-2007 on my winter tyres I was getting a couple of mpg less. This year, I have a DTUK 'green' box on, stepped up one notch. Not had it 'roaded', but guess from the performance it is about 170. Now with this, and my winters on again, I'm only getting actual 40-42. Mind you, I am making progress on my daily commute Oxford-LHR, mostly up at 80-85 in the outer lane(s) so maybe not bad. If I have the car long enough, I'll see what it is like back on summers later; the original tyres on my summer wheels, nearly out at around 3mm, are Conti Contact 3s, very noisy, and I will be fitting the wheels with Dunlop SP Fastresp XL - they have a good noise review and are 40-50 squid per tyre less!!
So maybe my Saab aint so bad on mpg after all. I do know that driving it like a Gordon McIver at around 70 on my commute for a few days produced over 50mpg on the SID, but s*d that - too boring. Now considering diconnecting the green box and only using it when I am pulling the caravan, as it is deffo more responsive under 1800 rpm.
Slightly O/T - 1) can one get a full size spare in the wheel well of an A4 Avant (nearly said estate....) 2) do the 2.0 TDis have swirl plates?

[Splash]

235/40 18 definitely fits but I've no idea what swirl plates are, unless they're the things that stop brake dust getting on your wheels (in which case "no").

[Petemate]

235/40 18 definitely fits but I've no idea what swirl plates are, unless they're the things that stop brake dust getting on your wheels (in which case "no").

Swirl plates are mentioned for 3 litre TDi engines. On Beemers, Saabs, Alfas, Vauxhalls, some Fiats, Mondys and Volvos, they are fitted to break up and evenly distribute the gases on low engine rpm. As the engine speed increases, they open up, fully at large throttle. They are a weak point of design on many diesels, Beemers being the worst for ingesting bits of them and lunching the engines followed by Mondys. For some reason, the Z19dth on the Saabs etc, although a pain when worn, do not seem to break up as much but if I keep mine I will be whipping the manifold off (quick when you say it like that lol) and giving it a good clean, then binning the flaps and blanking off the manifold. I just wondered if the 1.9 or 2.0 had them. I have seen horror pics of crud in VAG intakes, but cannot see any posts delving further.

[Splash]

Amazes me that I can get over 40 in my A6 3.0 TDI allroad, which is not only quattro, but I'm also running it on offroad tyres. DIS was actually showing 40.9 over 200 motorway miles trying to keep at 80 where possible.

Forgot the obvious - its automatic too.

A new personal best as i saw over 42 MPG averaged over the first half of the journey today, although this ended up at 41.5 due to the hills in Cumbria. I always find it strange that the increments used in the DIS calculation are so random. In comparison, the most I've ever achieved in my 170PD quattro over the same journey has been 44!

[GARYRICH]

Drive mine totally different, going to work never drop below 2000 revs and only use 6th on flat or downhill motorway stretches, have seen 45 on average. But toe down on way home averages 32. This is mostly motorway but it likes the revs. The old 1.9 was better below 2000 revs. The weight of the quattro and the 170 bhp 2.0 engine reduces consumption by about 25%. But i love it.

[SebRogers]

Drive mine totally different, going to work never drop below 2000 revs and only use 6th on flat or downhill motorway stretches, have seen 45 on average. But toe down on way home averages 32. This is mostly motorway but it likes the revs. The old 1.9 was better below 2000 revs. The weight of the quattro and the 170 bhp 2.0 engine reduces consumption by about 25%. But i love it.

That's more or less how I drive mine - and I get similar economy figures. The 170 is tuned completely differently from the 1.9 engines, which were all about low down torque. Personally I find there's enough low down torque on the 170 to bimble around in high gears if that's what you want, but it only really comes alive if you drive it like a petrol and use the revs - all of them :biglaugh: . It's a nice free-revving diesel with useable power all the way up to the red line, unlike my old pd130 which ran out of puff by about 3500rpm. The 170's great fun to drive that way but, inevitably, you pay for it at the pumps!

[cornwallman]

Having read this thread I ended up buying a B8 2.0 TFSI rather than the Tdi. The main reason was the Golf I had before, which had a DPF, kept going into regeneration because of my "short " journeys (9miles, 15 min commute and 10-12k a year), and the fuel economy was 46 in a car that should be doing 57-60.
I guessed the same would be true on short trips with the TDI Quattro DPF, in which case achieving even 36-40 might be optimistic. The 2.0 TFSI seems to do 30-32 at the moment, not sure if it was the right decision or not yet, but with petrol 8-10p a litre cheaper, the difference between 31 in petrol and 38 in diesel on 12,000 a year is about £300 extra for the petrol version.

[discobarry]

Well i have recently just returned from a a long trip where i did 2300miles mainly on motorways and with the boot full and winter tyres on i got about 40mpg on average which i was pretty pleased with really, since i got it and gave it a proper service it has been a lot better and i have recently done the cam belt and i pulled a lot of crap off the front of the face of the intercoolers when i took the bumper off and it has a little more pull since then.

I still plan on remapping it at some point but just to smooth it out some more although replacing it is another option but i don't know if the newer engines with quattro are a great deal better?

[SebRogers]

I still plan on remapping it at some point but just to smooth it out some more although replacing it is another option but i don't know if the newer engines with quattro are a great deal better?

IIRC the newer engines with quattro are nudging 50mpg (and lower CO2 as well), so they're quite a bit better...

[SebRogers]

I still plan on remapping it at some point but just to smooth it out some more although replacing it is another option but i don't know if the newer engines with quattro are a great deal better?

IIRC the newer engines with quattro are nudging 50mpg (and lower CO2 as well), so they're quite a bit better...