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Hi All,
I am new to the world of Smart so I thought I would share my first 2 weeks experience.
I previously owned a Citroen C5 tourer (new style) 2.0L Diesel, this is a lovely car and has served me well for over 2 years up and down the A3 to Guildford everyday from the south coast, but with a new baby and diesel prices rising, I passed on the C5 to my wife and looked for the cheapest car to own, settling on a 60 plate Smart CDi, passion, hard top, with 5000 miles on the clock, from Mercedes of Guildford on an Agility Finance.
First week was a bit of a write off as on day 2 I had the infamous power loss issue, a quick restart sorted it and got the car to the dealer who had it the whole week, they fitted the wiring mod and reseated the ERG? Sensor on a gromit to stop vibrations, fingers crossed this is now fixed, if not they can have the car back.
Second week I filled up to the brim on Saturday and Monday morning started the weekly commute Emsworth to Guildford 40 miles, 31ish on the A3. I have always been one of the faster drivers on the road not aggressive and never over 90. However a few weeks before I handed the C5 to my wife I noticed that trying to drive the A3 section of my commute as fast a safely possible only averaged 62mph! Sitting in the inside lane and relaxing, with the odd overtake of a truck or slow car 58mph! With this in mind I decided to enjoy the ride to work in the CDi, listening to the radio more and keeping with the flow of the traffic in the inside lane overtaking the odd truck etc, but never over 65mph for more than a few seconds, trying to keep the revs at a maximum of 2250 sometimes 2500.
I invested in the Torque app for my HTC and a Bluetooth OBD reader, however this was reading a disappointing average of 60mpg no matter how hard I tried to reduce it, I had some hope that the torque app needed calibrating and decided to continue my gentle commute, so come Friday (which been late and wanting get home to my wife and baby was a little faster drive than the rest of the week), when I got to the garage near home I was still on 2 dashes on the tank, I expected to have to put close to 30 litres in but was really chuffed that I only needed 23.5 (I even spilt some as I over filled!) that is 405 miles on 23.5 litres 78.5 mpg! I was getting 40-45mpg in the C5 so am saving close to £30 per week just on diesel.
I love the little car and at 67mpg the savings over the C5, now my wife is putting much less miles on the C5, would have covered its own lease cost (taking insurance, tyres and servicing into account) at 78 mpg we are saving money and my wife gets the bigger car she needs for baby stuff.
Sorry for the long first post I just wanted to show that steady driving can get you close to the mythical mpg.
Simon.
I am new to the world of Smart so I thought I would share my first 2 weeks experience.
I previously owned a Citroen C5 tourer (new style) 2.0L Diesel, this is a lovely car and has served me well for over 2 years up and down the A3 to Guildford everyday from the south coast, but with a new baby and diesel prices rising, I passed on the C5 to my wife and looked for the cheapest car to own, settling on a 60 plate Smart CDi, passion, hard top, with 5000 miles on the clock, from Mercedes of Guildford on an Agility Finance.
First week was a bit of a write off as on day 2 I had the infamous power loss issue, a quick restart sorted it and got the car to the dealer who had it the whole week, they fitted the wiring mod and reseated the ERG? Sensor on a gromit to stop vibrations, fingers crossed this is now fixed, if not they can have the car back.
Second week I filled up to the brim on Saturday and Monday morning started the weekly commute Emsworth to Guildford 40 miles, 31ish on the A3. I have always been one of the faster drivers on the road not aggressive and never over 90. However a few weeks before I handed the C5 to my wife I noticed that trying to drive the A3 section of my commute as fast a safely possible only averaged 62mph! Sitting in the inside lane and relaxing, with the odd overtake of a truck or slow car 58mph! With this in mind I decided to enjoy the ride to work in the CDi, listening to the radio more and keeping with the flow of the traffic in the inside lane overtaking the odd truck etc, but never over 65mph for more than a few seconds, trying to keep the revs at a maximum of 2250 sometimes 2500.
I invested in the Torque app for my HTC and a Bluetooth OBD reader, however this was reading a disappointing average of 60mpg no matter how hard I tried to reduce it, I had some hope that the torque app needed calibrating and decided to continue my gentle commute, so come Friday (which been late and wanting get home to my wife and baby was a little faster drive than the rest of the week), when I got to the garage near home I was still on 2 dashes on the tank, I expected to have to put close to 30 litres in but was really chuffed that I only needed 23.5 (I even spilt some as I over filled!) that is 405 miles on 23.5 litres 78.5 mpg! I was getting 40-45mpg in the C5 so am saving close to £30 per week just on diesel.
I love the little car and at 67mpg the savings over the C5, now my wife is putting much less miles on the C5, would have covered its own lease cost (taking insurance, tyres and servicing into account) at 78 mpg we are saving money and my wife gets the bigger car she needs for baby stuff.
Sorry for the long first post I just wanted to show that steady driving can get you close to the mythical mpg.
Simon.
. 
That's with careful driving, never more than 60mph, coasting into lower speed limit areas (rather than breaking hard at the last minute), and always accelerating gently. I've also fitted an after-market 
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