VW Passat TDI 130 sport- Poor MPG around town

[chrisb17]

Hi,

I have a 2003 Passat TDI 130 sport.
earlier in the year I had a ECU-re-map done but under hard driving there was a shed load's of black smoke visible from the exhaust & also think the MPG was down instead of up?

After a while I then decided to get the guy back & return the car back to standard.

The problem is that the car is only returning about 27-28 MPG around town which I think is crap!!

There is no loss of power & the car drives fine at present & just had a full service done a few weeks back with no problems found.

I was thinking of trying one of these plug & play boxes to see if things improved?
If not might get another car!

Has anyone else had any similar issues?


Chris

[PWE]

The wifes gt tdi 130(mk4golf) quite often gets below 30mpg round town and short distances. It too has been remapped but it was done before we bought it so dont know how aggresive its been done.
The best i've ever had out of it is 49.9mpg on long motorway journey....
Not bad for the performance i thought??

[steebo888]

sounds low.
ive got a mk4 golf gt tdi 150 and when driving round town/stop/start its normally high 30's/low 40's.
motorway jounrneys for works is 50-60.

[stainless_steve]

I have same model to go to work and back,12 miles stop start traffic and i'm getting 38.2 mpg

[benjdr]

steebo888 said:

sounds low.
ive got a mk4 golf gt tdi 150 and when driving round town/stop/start its normally high 30's/low 40's.
motorway jounrneys for works is 50-60.

I have the same car and I second these numbers

[gti-ted]

steebo888 said:

sounds low.
ive got a mk4 golf gt tdi 150 and when driving round town/stop/start its normally high 30's/low 40's.
motorway jounrneys for works is 50-60.

Off topic steebo and ben does your 150 smoke and run lumpy for a few seconds in a morning on cold start up ? It appears to be a common problem on the 150's

Edited by gti-ted on Thursday 11th December 10:07

[steebo888]

gti-ted said:

steebo888 said:

sounds low.
ive got a mk4 golf gt tdi 150 and when driving round town/stop/start its normally high 30's/low 40's.
motorway jounrneys for works is 50-60.

Off topic steebo and ben does your 150 smoke and run lumpy for a few seconds in a morning on cold start up ? It appears to be a common problem on the 150's

Edited by gti-ted on Thursday 11th December 10:07

Yep always get a bit of smoke when starting up in morning, it proper stinks. It can be lumpy idling until it warms up properly.

[gti-ted]

Cheers

[stewies_minion]

My Passat can go as low as 32 if I only use it around town. Particularly when it's freezing outside.

Perhaps try giving it a proper 15 / 20 mile run to sort it.

[kennym999]

Only had my passat 170tdi for about 2 months now. Best I have had over course of a tank is 44mpg (computer said nearly 48mpg). Problem is car doesnt heat up for 5 miles and my longest journey is 9 miles. Cold weather kills economy even when you drive for it.

[phumy]

steebo888 said:

gti-ted said:

steebo888 said:

sounds low.
ive got a mk4 golf gt tdi 150 and when driving round town/stop/start its normally high 30's/low 40's.
motorway jounrneys for works is 50-60.

Off topic steebo and ben does your 150 smoke and run lumpy for a few seconds in a morning on cold start up ? It appears to be a common problem on the 150's

Edited by gti-ted on Thursday 11th December 10:07

Yep always get a bit of smoke when starting up in morning, it proper stinks. It can be lumpy idling until it warms up properly.

Ive got one too, i can confirm the fuel consumption as 40's around town and mid 50's on the motorway. However dont get heavy smoke on start up nor do we get lumpy starts either, from cold. The car did have the chocolate camshaft changed for a real one, about 30k miles ago, which is a normal problem with the ARL engine (150 BHP PD TDi).

[shadwell davies]

Has the cam belt been changed recently?

If it has and the cam/pump timing has not been set correctly this will not help your problem.

[s3fella]

is the perfomrmance ok apart from that, or does it feel sluggish?

Do they have an EGR valve on the passat, (exhaust gas recric valve?)If so, clean that and consider blanking it off, (all diesles beneifit from this!)

It is also possible that the turbo vanes are sticky, whihc will give very poor low speed performance and pull, meaning you lose power low doen, use more "throttle" and ECU dumps in more diesel and you get lots a black smoke!
Stripping and cleaning turbo will fix this, common on all the VNT variable vane turbos tbh.