The price of fuel and your solutions for using less.

Well today I drove my Alfa 150 miles like the district nurse and managed to get 1mpg more, I was bored senseless, late getting to my first meeting and late home tomorrow I will be driving like an Italian again, sod the 50 pence saving.

 

Top up my T5 work van about twice a week, usually £60 worth. Worked out this week we're getting 30mpg !!
And we don't drive like senna everywhere anymore, more like Victor Meldrew !! lol !!

 

the mistake people make driving tdi's is they assume that taking it easy will save fuel. You have to have the turbo working or you're losing out on all the free power. Mine has 6 gears and in 'standard' mode it gets through the gears quickly and changes at lower revs. In sport it holds on to a gear for a lot longer so changes up at higher revs. Boot it at 110 and it changes down into 5th

I prefer to boot it everywhere - it sounds better and is lots more fun than fuel saving. It is environmentally friendly though as it has the DPF so doesn't belch out clouds of diesel smoke.

Its bit of an odd topic on a forum for one of the least fuel efficient vehicles you can drive.

When they make trains or buses which take me to the door of my destination, each with a personal carriage which has been cleaned for me and I don't have to share air with other people or listen to chavs on their mobiles or ipod, i'll change my driving habits. Until then i'll just keep pumping gas

 

the topic wasn't started with a view to getting onto discussing how fuel inefficient the vans are, moreso to see and discuss how other people are suffering with the ever increasing fuel costs, some of us don't earn 30 grand plus or have top up benefits etc, some of us just scrape by and have to see what others are doing or thinking of doing to pull the strings a bit tighter.

 

Love driving my 1300 bug as my daily, and driving my bay even more. I don't really look at the fuel consumption just fill it up when empty. You only live once

 

I can't believe what incredibly rubbish mpg some of these modern town cars get. Joker's right - if you do any miles it's worth changing your car to a fuel efficient one. The only problem is when you get 3x mpg from your car as from your bus and scraping along, it's hard to joy-ride the bus round.

Joker - it is possible to be skint and cling on to your bus - many times I've been in debt to the value of my bus and the sensible thing would have been to sell it, but we're not sensible are we or we wouldn't buy them in the first place. I can't afford to drive mine right now - I'd rather drive the golf and have a glass or two of wine of an evening, but my time will come.

 

It doesn't really matter what you earn, you always spend it. Zoe and I make very good money but it all goes and the fuel prices certainly don't help.

 

Our Fiat 500 is a fun car. The auto is a breeze in traffic and switching it to manual and hitting the sport button makes it even more fun to drive. Even my father has come run to driving it in manual sport mode. But it's only a 1.4 and my 2 litre Golf returns similar MPG and is more comfy in town or on the freeway.

You are right however about buying a more efficient car. Citroens C1 are crazy little things and quite fun. Or of you want motoring on the cheap a Fiat Secento is great. A friend of mine swears by it.

I think it's time to wave bye bye to the Beetle Ricky.

 

i think ricky should sell the beetle and get a smart car

 

I spend a shed load of money to get to work, 50 miles each way + £6 a day toll
I have a 2 litre insignia diesel and I rarely go over 60 on the motorway. I can get 850 miles per tank doing this or if I go faster I get 560 miles per tank so by taking it easy I get 3 days more driving per tank.
I have just accepted a new job, 52 miles away no toll and they will pay my fuel so I will be able to use my bus! (but not for the commute)

 

I have a sad little daily driver a Peugeot 206 1.4 HDI but it saves me a fortune on fuel and road tax. 65MPG and £30 a year road tax. Had it 7 years now and not had to spend too much on it. I would recommend one to anyone looking for a cheap running car.
I just use my Bus for pleasure I only ever seem to get 20MPG out of it no matter how I drive. But I think we all agree we love our Dubs and no matter what the Governments do Im sure we will find ways of keeping them on the road. Even when the petrol does eventually run out. We will have to find alternitive fuel or engines. Electric powered Campers we could all be driving Milk Floats :

 

I sold my 03 1.9 tdi passat to my friend for £1000 it had done 186k and was easily doing high 40 mid 50 mpg.

Okay the price was mates rate, but I don't see them being much higher.

Was an amazing car and pulled

I think people also need to do a little research into cars, if they worry about mpg + other costs.
Now I have my new passat 2.0tdi I knew most the common problems, tax bracket, service costs, mpg ect

But now I'm working in town and on a new site, I do short trips or just ride my bike to the train station.
So at the moment fuel isn't a problem, but in a few months, I could be working an hour maybe more away from home but I have factored these costs in.

 

i must admit i acted on impulse when i bought the beetle, did no research just liked it....think it's the shock of going from 50+mpg to less than half that's getting to me, plus £260 a year tax......will probably review if it has to go in the next few months, as i've said before if i can make the van reliable and i trust it i'll probably go down to 1 vehicle and walk/cycle and public transport a bit more, that said though it doesn't detract from my original post which wasn't to specifically moan about the beetle moreso to get a discussion going on how other people are coping with increased fuel costs and the price of living these days.

 

well things have got that tight here at the minute
we sit around a CANDLE now for a heat







if it gets any colder i ll light it

lol











the other day i heard aloud bang on the garage door

when i opened it
there was this brass monkey

holding a pair of plumbs in his hand
cause it was so cold




he said excuse me do ye do welding

lol owen nw

 

very good owen made me smile.