Audi A3 - excessive fuel consumption

PrettyBoy

I bought a very unloved Audi A3 recently - a 2005 1.6 Petrol with just 70k miles but this was due to neglect more than anything as far as I can tell. There was no book with it but I know it hadn't been serviced in a long time so I had my mechanic change the filters and the timing belt. He informed me that the belt that he took out was the original one (12 years old) so that's a good indication of the life this car's had.

Anyway, I've been driving the car for the last few days (stop-start city driving) and it seems to be running alright but the fuel consumption is excessive. It might be too soon to tell and I'm going to keep a close eye on it for the next few days but on Tuesday night I put €30 petrol into it (half-full tank) and I've driven 30 miles since. The petrol gauge says it's got a quarter of a tank left now. If it keeps going the way it has been and I drive another 30 miles it will be just about empty. Following this formula, I fill it up at a cost of around €60 I'll get around 120 miles - I know these have a bit of a reputation for being thirsty but that is ridiculously excessive, no? What could cause such excessive consumption?

wonski

PrettyBoy wrote: »

I bought a very unloved Audi A3 recently - a 2005 1.6 Petrol with just 70k miles but this was due to neglect more than anything as far as I can tell. There was no book with it but I know it hadn't been serviced in a long time so I had my mechanic change the filters and the timing belt. He informed me that the belt that he took out was the original one (12 years old) so that's a good indication of the life this car's had.

Anyway, I've been driving the car for the last few days (stop-start city driving) and it seems to be running alright but the fuel consumption is excessive. It might be too soon to tell and I'm going to keep a close eye on it for the next few days but on Tuesday night I put €30 petrol into it (half-full tank) and I've driven 30 miles since. The petrol gauge says it's got a quarter of a tank left now. If it keeps going the way it has been and I drive another 30 miles it will be just about empty. Following this formula, I fill it up at a cost of around €60 I'll get around 120 miles - I know these have a bit of a reputation for being thirsty but that is ridiculously excessive, no? What could cause such excessive consumption?

Don't look at the gauge or the range on the display.

Fill it up to full, drive for 100 or 200 km and top up again. These gauges and computers can be deceiving.

ION08

PrettyBoy wrote: »

Following this formula, I fill it up at a cost of around €60 I'll get around 120 miles

Wrong Formula.

Fill it up . Drive it to near empty or even half empty. Fill up again and see how many miles/kms you have covered and how many Litres you've used.

i57dwun4yb1pt8

think i used to get 420 miles on a full tank in mine , motorway or about 300 city drving 12 galon 55 litre tank i think

miles - not km

mine was a 2002 5 door attraction 16 valve i think .

the gauges were not great i rem that , the gauge clusters in the older a3s used to suffer issues .

also had issue wit hte crank vent valve assembly which seemed to give it better mileage after replacement , not sure why though

make sure your brakes are not sticking as well, carefully check disks are not red hot after driving ,
or if brakes feel spongy after a while , could be casuing this low mileage

MrCostington

I have an A4 1.6 petrol and get about 23 to 25 MPG (your speedo is in miles, yeah?) in mostly heavy traffic.

To measure, I fill up as soon ah the light/beep comes on - I'm usually at most 2 miles from a station. I get 45.5 liters which is exactly 10 gallon and reset my trip, the just divide by ten next time you hear the beep!

As other have said the trip computer is usually way off.

Cee-Jay-Cee

The gauge is a rough indicator as to when the tank is empty or full, everything in between is merely an estimate. Like said above, fill the car to the neck, reset the trip meter and drive it till the light comes on and fill again and see how many miles you got. Divide the miles by the amount of fuel used to determine an accurate MPG figure.