Hey Everyone! I have recently been in the market for a new LR2 and stumbled across this board a few weeks ago. First I have to say this seems like one of the best informed / helpful car forms I have been on in a long time, but enough of that. So reading reviews of the LR2 and test driving one I noticed the not-all-that-great mpg rating of 16 / 23 and thought that surly such an advanced engine would get better gas milage. Upon investigation of the gas milage ratings on the LR2 I found that the United States Government fuel economy ratings were achieved while running the car on Regular Gas!! (87oct here) you can find these results yourself here : http://www.fueleconomy.gov/ (sorry It doesn't allow direct linking). So my question for all you i6 owners out there,

Do you achieve a 16 - 23 mpg range with a 19mpg average like the fueleconomy.gov site lists or do you get an 19 - 33mpg range with a 25mpg average like many of the European countries rating systems state?

I'm just a 19 year old with an awesome job and a pretty unreliable car I want to trade in and I have done the math and worked out the calculations on payments and how much it will wind up costing me, but I would like to be able to figure out how much I am saving on gas!

Thanks in advance,
Nick

Welcome on bord, Nick. As you have said, it is a very good community and a well informed too.
Now coming back to your question on fuel consumption.
In Europe you will mostly see the Freelander 2 with the TD4 diesel engine, as petrol is very costly over here, and diesel is considerably cheaper. Besides this, diesel engines consume less. This is the reason why in Europe 90% of the SUV's have diesel engines, besides the fact, that modern turbo-diesel engines do have a much higher torque at low rev's than petrol engines.
So, diesel-fuel consumption of my FL2 TD4 is around 8,5 litre per 100 km (or 27,62 mpg) with Automatic and aircon.
Being aware that diesel engines are not (at present - but I am sure that this will change) widely availabe in the USA, the Freelander 2 with the inline 6 petrol engine will consume around 18,8 mpg in comparison.

Yamaha-Fan

The UK must be different to the rest of Europe then........Diesel is normally more expensive over here than petrol  ______________________
2011 Full Fat RR 4.4 TDV8
2012 FL2 SD4 Auto HSE
2013 Kawasaki Versys 650

2-3 pence per litre normally, 10 years ago it was cheaper. Funny how now we all use diesel the price swings from cheapest to dearest Coincidence????me thinks not.

Guys, I said EUROPE - not UK. No, joke aside, in Benelux, Germany, Italy, France, Spain and in most eastern countries diesel is cheaper than petrol. That is the reason why in Germany 9 out of 10 FL2 are diesel's, and I believe a similar ratio you will find in Austria, Italy, France and Spain.
In Germany, the price difference diesel over petrol is 18 to 20 Euro Cent per litre.
The reason is the lower tax on diesel in Germany due to the very powerful road transport lobby.

YF

yamaha-fan wrote:

In Germany, the price difference diesel over petrol is 18 to 20 Euro Cent per litre.

macattack15 wrote:

I'm just a 19 year old with an awesome job and a pretty unreliable car

Bank robber.....me thinks

Hi Nick, welcome to the board. We're seeing about 19mpg (US) in normal usage, which in our case means the one mile trip to work for my wife and various errands around town. On the highway it's more like 24mpg.

There was some discussion on a thread a few months ago about improved mileage with Premium fuel. I generally run Regular because we live in Colorado at 5,000 feet, which makes higher octane less necessary. I did try Premium fuel for a tank or two and saw a small improvement but there were so many variables involved that I don't know that the test was valid. Premium runs about 10% higher than Regular so it would require a similar 10% improvement in economy to break even. Assuming ~20mpg that means a 2mpg improvement, which is at best what I noticed in terms of improved economy (again, VERY unscientifically). Now, as for reduced CO2 emmissions perhaps a break even trade off makes it worthwhile.

All that said, the LR2 is a great car/truck/SUV/4x4 and we've been very pleased with it after 5 months. To be able to have the space, capabilities and luxury of this vehicle and still get 24mpg on the highway (4mpg better than our old minivan, btw) is impressive in my book. Greg East
Loveland, Colorado
USA
'08 LR2 Hers
'93 740i Mine
'87 944 turbo Mistress

Haha, First of all I would like to say I'm not a bank robber gambba, I just happen to work for a fruity company, you could say, that makes one hell of an mp3 player / cellphone / internet communicator... and that same company gives me a discount on land rovers! Thanks for the info ColoradoLR2, here where I live it works out about exactly the same to run premium if i get the better gas milage, Do you notice any knocks or pings running on regular as the manual suggests may happen? I want this car to last me a longgggg time, lol!

Thanks,
Nick

macattack15 wrote:

Haha, First of all I would like to say I'm not a bank robber gambba

Now I'm disappointed

Sounds like you're on a winner with your company....especially as they have arrangements with Land Rover

Oh...almost forgot welcome to the boards

P.S. PM sent about Ipod stuff as per Nightfox's suggestion!!!

You KNOW everyone's going to be PM'ing you now to see if you can get cheap iPod Touches, don't you?

first of all welcome nick!

secondly, I'm a "Converted" (meaning I'm now a mac user/lover) so do I hear any software discounts from you?

and to answer your question, our LR2 MPG @4500 miles now is around 18.7 - 19.8 combined highway/city driving
this is a result of the wife driving on auto while in my hands she's on manual/sports mode.

and oh she only drinks Shell Premium 91 Octane.

 Do Not Follow Me...You Can't Go Where I Go!!!

.....up in the tree!!!

macattack15 wrote:

Do you notice any knocks or pings running on regular as the manual suggests may happen?

No and if I did I'd definitely switch to Premium, although with modern knock detection I don't know that you'd ever hear it, the computer would just pull timing until the ping went away. That said, I didn't really notice any improvement in performance when it was on 91 octane on my butt dyno, although if the bump in fuel economy was real then maybe there's something there.

I suspect the knock sensor advances the timing to the edge of knock regardless of what octane fuel you're running so I don't think running 87 vs 91 is any harder on the engine. Again, keep in mind that this is at 5,000 feet (1524 meters) of elevation and the lower density of the air makes engines less prone to knock. YMMV.

BTW, I work for a certain 'light emitting star' high tech company that also offers the Ford Xplan, which is what I used to buy the LR2 with...with Land Rover up for sale by Ford I'd suggest you hurry!

Oh, and I recently bought an 80gb iPod for me and a new Nano for my daughter, so I'm good  Greg East
Loveland, Colorado
USA
'08 LR2 Hers
'93 740i Mine
'87 944 turbo Mistress

Wish I was getting similar mileage. My LR2, with about 600 miles on it thus far, is only getting a little higher than 14 mpg in city (New York) driving. Granted that is stop and go all the way ; ) However, I've seen it go as high as 23-24 mpg when on the highway.

BTW, I wonder if some of the differences in MPG between what is reported on US LR2's and UK FL2's is related to differences in the size of a gallon (1 imperial gallon=1.2 US gallons).

My site has a real-world fuel economy survey, but I don't think there are any responses for the LR2 yet.

Unlike other such surveys, mine asks about driving conditions and driving style, but is still short enough to fill out quickly.

I am based in the U.S., so only the U.S. LR2 model and powertrains are in the database. If someone can provide basic specs for the European/UK powertrains (displacement, HP@rpm, Torque@rpm, transmission type, transmission speeds), I can enter those. I'd do this under the LR2, not Freelander 2, to avoid having information on the model in two different places. truedelta.com
Vehicle reliability, fuel economy, and price comparison information