Tanks for the memories!

[320touring]

Prompted by filling the loaner mk2 CRV I have today, what cars have surprised you with their capacity or otherwise?

Any tales of conspicuous consumption or fantasy frugality?

 

The CRV was light on, needle at the bottom.

46.4L to fill - apparently only has a 58L tank?! Doesn't last long coupled to the 3 speed auto.

 

Worst for conspicuous consumption was in 2006 on a trip back from Odessa in Ukraine. The last leg of the return was Munich to Whitburn, approx 1100miles, and 4 tanks of fuel in the 320i.

Total time for the 1100 miles? 24hrs split between 2 drivers..

[Heidel_Kakao]

A Stolly has 400 mile range and does 4 miles per gallon. You do the sums haha.

[beko1987]

My old xm had a massive tank. I remember my dad and myself meeting at Wolverhampton for a gig and kind father said "pull into the next petrol station son and I'll fill it up for you" 

I paused twice and confirmed if he didn't just want to stop (it was empty) and it took over £100 of petrol. Got 400 plus miles from that which was the most I've ever done I'd usually stick £40 in for the week and even then I couldn't really afford it

[eifion]

10 minutes ago, beko1987 said:

My old xm had a massive tank. I remember my dad and myself meeting at Wolverhampton for a gig and kind father said "pull into the next petrol station son and I'll fill it up for you" 

I paused twice and confirmed if he didn't just want to stop (it was empty) and it took over £100 of petrol. Got 400 plus miles from that which was the most I've ever done I'd usually stick £40 in for the week and even then I couldn't really afford it

If I remember correctly my diesel XM had an 80 litre tank. I think I only ever filled it once when we were off to Scotland on holiday and the on-board computer said it'd do about 630 miles on that.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

About 15 yeas ago we went on holiday to Florida and as I’ve got loads of kids and had a Grand Voyager at home upgraded the rental to an Econoline minibus thing. It was so much fun leaving black lines at every set of lights and doing big smoky u-turns when I got lost. I was amazed how economical it was , it was a week before I had to put fuel in…

After about 18 gallons I started looking underneath in case it was leaking straight out the bottom, the fecker took about 30 gallons . Not quite as economical as I thought then !

Luckily it was 50p to the Dollar so was still cheaper than filling up at home

 

[Sham]

Talking of Grand Voyagers. I once had a V8 Auto.

Sub 20mpg was the norm if you went, or even briefly considered going, above 2k rpm.

Other end of the scale is the 1.0 Turbo, with an auto box, in the Vitara that I'm amazed by. Does 48mpg even when being enthusiastic and enjoying the 3 cylinder growl.

[Six-cylinder]

Back many years ago I filled at an Esso station and heard the next customer giving the cashier an ear bending for giving me a glass instead of a token towards a glass as he had been given. She explained I had earnt 3 tokens with my fill and therefore earned a glass in one! The car was this 1972 Reliant Scimitar 5a with a 20 gallon fuel tank.

[CreepingJesus]

The one I could never get my head around was the 10V 140bhp V70 having roughly the same economy as the 850 T-5. If anything the T-5 was slightly better. The V70 was driven 'briskly' - about as good as it gets with those - but the T-5 spent half its time in hooligan mode. Same roads, same journeys, same fuel from the same pumps.

Conversely, my mate's old Chrysler (certainly a proper old carby V8, allegedly the 440) had a 'fuel drain pedal' rather than a throttle. Didn't go any faster if you buried it, it just opened up the variable aperture in the tank.

[PhilA]

This has a 125 litre tank. (£155 to fill at today's prices, $47 here). 

Driven carefully it returns halfway decent fuel economy, but mashing the loud pedal returns 2-3mpg, but in this case it actually goes fast. (6.2 seconds 0-60 and a 14 second 1/4 mile).

It's actually quite scary how fast it goes, given how big it is. 

[NorfolkNWeigh]

I had a company 740 GLE  (G170 UTM ) for a few months that had been specc’d with a bigger petrol tank by the first user chooser, just because he had a budget and price list. It also had 5 spoke wheels so looked like a Turbo. There was a lump in the boot floor, I liked it because I could thrash it to my Dad’s house in Wales and back to MK without having to refuel.

Mercedes w212 e classes have  smaller tanks on e220’s than e350’s( and probably other bigger engines) . This is why I have a 220- you can’t get 2 big cases in a 350 boot.

[garethj]

I had a Volvo 740 GLE with the 2.3 litre engine and manual box with overdrive.  Around the doors it gave mid 20s mpg but on a motorway run it would hit 37mpg even when really tanking on.

I had a ZZR 1100 that did upper 40s to the gallon, simply because you were always riding it to about 35% of its capabilities.  During one memorable trip I averaged 120mph which meant quite a lot of time at over 150.  It must have thought it’s birthday had come.

[St.Jude]

My Peugeot 3008 would do 660miles on the one tank of diesel.

That was about the only thing it was good for.

[spike60]

I have a 2.8 BMW Z3 which isn't terrible on fuel, 26-33 mpg, but it has a 50L tank which is terrible. Every time I fill it it says 375 miles or something range but the fuel light comes on after about 225 miles to no ones surprise!

[spike60]

I also used to have a 1986 Transit MK2 Di coachbuilt camper, 3200 kg and 3m high that had a 9 gallon tank. That didn't go far either but took much longer to get there!

[HMC]

Classic 900s have a 50 litre tank; if you were driving a t16 hard (at least in my hands) you could use a tank in just over 200 miles which always felt a bit restrictive- maybe a legacy of it having been developed out of a smaller vehicle; itself developed and packaged in the 60s.

[TheOtherStu]

I have a BMW 330e company car. 40 litres. That's it.

An absolute pain in the 'arris when doing long journeys because it's lucky to do 30mpg. 🤣

[HMC]

Discovery 2s have a 95 litre tank- that was the first car I spent over £100 filling. In my hands about 30 mpg (td5) meant a range of under 600 miles. 
 

My a6 c5 TDI had a range of comfortably over 680 miles which meant driving to Germany could be done without refilling on the outward leg, something I used to do regularly. I also did the same journey in a 500sel w126 which needed rather more filling up, with a fuel gauge that would visibly move whilst cruising at 120mph.

[spike60]

I used to have a 1.4 Tdi Polo with a 45L tank, I drove from Redcar to Le Mans on a tank then filled for 45  Euro, -£30 at the time! Probably c2015

[myglaren]

I've had a couple of C5 2.0 HDi's.  Allegedly 65L tanks that I could squeeze >72L in.

Consumption was abysmal but due to it mainly doing four 4-mile trips every 24 hours.

I did manage just short of 700 miles on one tank, Washington to Bedford, MK and surrounding areas and back, still fuel for three days left.

I once stopped at a BP station where diesel was supposed to be cheaper.

Realised that I was filling with the premium diesel when it went over £100.

I expected the Civic to perform better.  It doesn't.

[DoctorRetro]

Owned one of these:

Over 60 litres to fill it. Best I ever got was 23mpg.

Worst was 9mpg! 

2.8 V6, FWD, 3 spd auto column shift.

[ProgRocker]

My new i10 has a 35 litre tank. I was delighted when filling it to the brim the day after picking it up and spending less than £40 filling it up!

MPG is currently only around 41, mostly urban. Only marginally better than the Almera diesel it replaced. However, I am stuck in crawling traffic quite a bit as roadworks taking place on the nearby bypass, so half the traffic are deciding to come through the city. Hoping mpg will improve once this congestion from hell buggers off. 

[Dan the van]

My old Kawasaki KH500 triple has a three and a half gallon tank,including reserve.20mpg if you're lucky.Will pass anything except a petrol station.

[Dan the van]

20 hours ago, Heidel_Kakao said:

A Stolly has 400 mile range and does 4 miles per gallon. You do the sums haha.

TBH,that's not bad.I'd have thought it would be gallons to the mile.🤣

[warch]

My petrol Series II Landrover is suspiciously fuel efficient, it rarely drops below 20mpg. I have driven other examples that do 10-14 to the gallon. If you fill the tank right up the float for the sender bangs against the top of the tank. 

My Triumph is 955cc and has 150hp, it also does 200 miles until the light comes on, the refill is 21 quid so over 50mpg, which is nice.

The most surprising car* I had for good economy was a work Mitsubishi Warrior with all the bells and whistles and 170hp. I'd have thought perhaps 30mpg if driven carefully, but did 32-37 to the gallon most of the time I used it. Not bad given that it was 4x4 and bloody long. Had a monster van sized tank too.

Conversely I don't remember my old Mini ever doing more than about 30-35 to the gallon, even with the 998 engine.

[horriblemercedes]

20 hours ago, Sham said:

Talking of Grand Voyagers. I once had a V8 Auto.

Sub 20mpg was the norm if you went, or even briefly considered going, above 2k rpm.

Other end of the scale is the 1.0 Turbo, with an auto box, in the Vitara that I'm amazed by. Does 48mpg even when being enthusiastic and enjoying the 3 cylinder growl.

A V8 Voyager? 

[Split_Pin]

Rover 75 diesel auto with a mild remap is very poor at 35mpg. With the tiny mileage I cover its not a problem to me though.

Cavalier diesel, I don't think its possible to get less than 49mpg. To bring this to life, I got the car 2 weeks ago with a full tank, drove it back to Central Scotland from Newcastle and have used it on average every third day since doing local trips and its still got well over half a tank.

The worst one was our 2012 Chevrolet Aveo 1.2 Twinport petrol. 39mpg was the absolute best I ever nursed out of it. Big car and a small engine do not always make good bedfellows.

[Sham]

56 minutes ago, horriblemercedes said:

A V8 Voyager? 

You'll know this already, as you've queried it... Wiki says only a V6 was available. Now, my memory isn't what it could be and I've had a lot of cars over the years - and the Chrysler only briefly - but I'm bloody sure it was a V8. Confusion reigns here, but the obvious answer is that I'm going senile...

[sutty2006]

19 hours ago, PhilA said:

This has a 125 litre tank. (£155 to fill at today's prices, $47 here). 

Driven carefully it returns halfway decent fuel economy, but mashing the loud pedal returns 2-3mpg, but in this case it actually goes fast. (6.2 seconds 0-60 and a 14 second 1/4 mile).

It's actually quite scary how fast it goes, given how big it is. 

I’d happily run one of those as a daily if fuel prices were that cheap over here. 

[Snake Charmer]

22 hours ago, Heidel_Kakao said:

A Stolly has 400 mile range and does 4 miles per gallon. You do the sums haha.

Something I would love to own one day. 👍

I put some fuel in my Jensen Interceptor when the light was on and went for a hoon about until the light came on again, 4mpg. 🙈

[horriblemercedes]

1 hour ago, Sham said:

You'll know this already, as you've queried it... Wiki says only a V6 was available. Now, my memory isn't what it could be and I've had a lot of cars over the years - and the Chrysler only briefly - but I'm bloody sure it was a V8. Confusion reigns here, but the obvious answer is that I'm going senile...

I don't even know why I know the engine range for the Voyager 🙃 

 

It was an era that Chrysler didn't offer V8s in 'normal' cars - only in 4x4s, pick ups, vans etc