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Re: high fuel consumption
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Posted by aaron [Email] (more from aaron) on Wed, 6 Oct 2004 18:17:30 Share Post by Email
In Reply to: high fuel consumption, jh, Wed, 6 Oct 2004 15:58:14
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what is 30-40% too much, what are you reading around town in traffic, and highway?

i'll share what i've learned:

the single most important improvement i made in MPG was changing an air filter in my 92 9000S standard trans after fuel economy had slowly dropped down to 30 highway. after air filter it jumped up to 34 with ease.

i then checked the plugs, found little left of them (i hadn't changed them since i had bought the car 30K+ miles before, and who knows how old they were before that - i posted pics on here awhile back). shockingly, i changed the plugs and didn't notice a difference in fuel economy, just a little peppier, which leads me to guess that with a good DI, plugs are meaningless to MPG unless fouled or the wrong plug.

recently, i was really concerned about my 93 CSE auto after i bought it because mileage was low, 15-16 mpg in all the stoplight traffic where i live. my 92 9000S was getting 20+mpg in the same traffic, so I started doing everything I could think of:

found bosch plugs replaced with NGK
swapped DI cassette with 92 9000 (looked in better shape)
ran fuel injector cleaner
checked air filter which was clean
checked maintenance records, showing recent throttle body cleaning, sensor replacement, etc., when it failed a state inspection
replaced seized rear calipers which sounded like they were dragging just a bit because i could hear them rubbing all the time

lately i'm getting 17-18 around town so far. the car seemed to get better after a highway trip, which maybe suggests the fuel injector cleaner, unless the ECU learned something from all the changes???

car runs much better, especially after removing DI springs and stretching them back out to make better contact (maybe my imagination, but it seems better). recent highway gave me 35 on a trip that i used to get 34 in the 92 standard, which gave me my all-time mpg record in a saab!

now, i've also had an experience with a 95 subaru legacy (which i sold to pay for my 90 9000 and 92 9000 that i bought a couple years ago, a very good trade)

i originally bought it in the winter of 98, and i noticed suddenly one day in the spring that the car seemed peppier and i was getting better gas mileage, and i thought, huh, and then things were great until the next fall when all of a sudden gas mileage went down, and then in the spring it came to life again, and somehow, i learned at that time, that reformulated gasoline does a # on subaru performance, which i confirmed by calling subaru.

so, that would be another thing to check, it is october, do you live up north???

it may just be the gas, in which case, i noticed that lucas fuel treatment improved performance in my subaru on winter gas.

can't say that i noticed as much of a difference, seasonally, in my saabs before i moved to florida.

anyway, the last thing that happened with the subaru was a mystery, i was getting 40 mpg driving from mass to ct, and maybe 32-34 on the way back (more uphill),

then i had the timing belt changed, and soon after noticed my fuel economy was way down. i could only get 32 from mass to ct, and maybe 28 on the way back, in the summer. also noticed a slight vibration at idle that didn't used to be there, and when i was getting ready to sell the car, with a clear conscience, i had it checked by a subaru mechanic who found nothing wrong, had it hooked up to all his computers, and then by my favorite indy who found something, was it a loose motor mount, or exhaust, or something, that improved the vibe a little at idle, and an 02 sensor that was reading slightly off, otherwise, the car was perfect, with new plugs and wires, bottles of fuel injector cleaner.

their only suggestion was a partially clogged injector, or the 02 sensor, and i sold it, with my story, and don't know what's happened since, but something changed in that car, and a year or so later i was in the saab listening to 'clic and clac' on the radio and they mentioned to a caller that perhaps their mechanic had installed the timing belt incorrectly on their car, which allowed it to run basically ok, but a little off, and then i remembered that my subaru did start getting less mileage after i did the timing belt (water pump was being replaced, so i splurged since it was right there and hadn't been done).

i'm not aware that this same issue could effect a 9000's timing chain, doubtful from what i've read on this list, but someone with more knowledge could tell for sure.

that's my 20 cents. winter gas and air filter would be first to check, unless it's really bad, how bad is it??



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