so i'm getting roughly 32mpg with my 1.2 polo 3 cylinder.

Back and forth to work town driving however i try to drive economically no heavy acceleration high gear low revs, surely i should get more mpg out of such a small engine?

any other 1.2 owners out there with poor fuel consumption?

This is NOT specifically 1.2 Polo related.

Fuel consumption depends on many things, as you have pointed out.

Heavy acceleration is certainly one of the worst for making it use a lot of petrol.

I know that the general advice for conserving petrol is to get into a high gear ASAP, BUT you can actually over-do this! If you change 'up' too early, you are probably driving with the throttle well open in order to make it 'go' in the higher gear, this will INCREASE consumption.

Turn your music 'off' and listen to your engine!

I note that you seem to be driving in traffic for longish parts of your journey, so it is unlikely that you will ever get out of third gear. This all adds up to using more petrol than you would expect and I have never KNOWN anyone achieve manufacturers consumption figures, even though people claim to.

Regards.

Check your tyre pressures too.

Gov figure os 36 miles per imperial gallon in (ideal simulated) city

http://www.autoevolution.com/cars/volkswagen-polo-5-doors-2001.html#aeng_volkswagen-polo-5-doors-2001-12-55-hp

and the 'true mpg' predicts 35-ish using http://www.whatcar.com/truempg/my-true-mpg

-though that was for the 1.2 (60hp),

On the 55 peak torque is at 3000rpm so that might help guide the gear change-up point.

German drivers used to be taught to keep their engines in their 2000-3000rpm band and this has guided the modern ECU power profiles a Ricardo engineer explained to me.

Bet there'e no dashboard rev counter.

Edited 13 July, 201412 yr by dvderlm