Thread: New Hilux Fuel Consumption

Originally Posted by c-dog

Might be worth asking the dealer if they will tune etc, mate had this done on his dmax (probably 3 years ago now) from new and retained the factory warranty (unsure if the dealer did it or outsourced the work)

Do the sums on how far you have to drive to see a return on the cost of a tune, assuming that you achieve the promised fuel consumption improvement.

Then… retrain your right foot to lift and coast. Drop 5km/h off your max cruising speed. Don’t carry unnecessary weight.

Look at what just happened to the fuel consumption.

Put factory spec road tyres back on and watch the consumption fall by twice what a tune will give you.

Been through all of this for many years. Have run two sets of tyres on Hilux since the early 90s. Just recently put Toyo Open Country ATs on the wife’s Highlander due to tyre damage on the previous Goodyear HT tyres from the rough metal roads. Consumption immediately increased by 1.8L/100km. You can feel the increased rolling resistance.

I’d hate to see you waste money trying to chase a small decrease in fuel consumption.

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Do the sums on how far you have to drive to see a return on the cost of a tune, assuming that you achieve the promised fuel consumption improvement.

Then… retrain your right foot to lift and coast. Drop 5km/h off your max cruising speed. Don’t carry unnecessary weight.

Look at what just happened to the fuel consumption.

Put factory spec road tyres back on and watch the consumption fall by twice what a tune will give you.

Been through all of this for many years. Have run two sets of tyres on Hilux since the early 90s. Just recently put Toyo Open Country ATs on the wife’s Highlander due to tyre damage on the previous Goodyear HT tyres from the rough metal roads. Consumption immediately increased by 1.8L/100km. You can feel the increased rolling resistance.

I’d hate to see you waste money trying to chase a small decrease in fuel consumption.

Good point, to be fair my mate was after more power rather than economy as he wasn't paying for the diesel.

You have to compare horses really
Upgrade to 150 kw comes at a price.
My 2021 hilux has pretty much all mods.
Driving normally withoit towing just under 10 l per 100 km
Towing the side by side 13 l per 100
It uses approx 2 more litres per hundred than my 2018 model

Originally Posted by Hornady ELDX

You have to compare horses really
Upgrade to 150 kw comes at a price.
My 2021 hilux has pretty much all mods.
Driving normally withoit towing just under 10 l per 100 km
Towing the side by side 13 l per 100
It uses approx 2 more litres per hundred than my 2018 model

The marketing tells you the latest engine upgrade makes it 10% more efficient on fuel

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Put factory spec road tyres back on and watch the consumption fall by twice what a tune will give you.
Been through all of this for many years. Have run two sets of tyres on Hilux since the early 90s. Just recently put Toyo Open Country ATs on the wife’s Highlander due to tyre damage on the previous Goodyear HT tyres from the rough metal roads. Consumption immediately increased by 1.8L/100km. You can feel the increased rolling resistance.

Been slowly setting up the latest workwagon (and play wagon) sticking with same OA diameter and width tyre but swapping from the factory highway tyre to Falken AT3W ATs has made 0.4L/100km increase in fuel consumption.
Even with roof racks on still getting 9.4L/km average including some light towing so not bad (new shape BT50)

Originally Posted by stagstalker

The marketing tells you the latest engine upgrade makes it 10% more efficient on fuel

On a factory vehicle with correct tyre pressures, as an average of all highway conditions.

Increase weight, rolling resistance and decrease aero and the $$$$$$ will fly out of your pocket.

Auto

@Echo Auto

Interesting thing with the 2013 ranger I have - currently running 8.5L/100Km reported on the display, and it's reasonably close to what I work out on the receipts. That's .4 higher than factory and it's on aftermarket suspension with about a 2" up at the back and 1 and a bit at the front.

Ford replaced the rear springs without touching the front which resulted in a 3" lift at the back and 1" drop at the front - made the thing a widowmaker fu*ken dangerous. I stopped driving it until I fixed it it was that bad, totally fluffed the front end alignment and it was completely uncontrollable. But, interesting finding with that much of a wedge driving down the road - fuel consumption dropped by about 1.4L/100Km, I was getting 6.9L/100Km. So possibly the aerodynamic effects of how we set the ute up on aftermarket suspension has more of an effect that we would think. The snorkel does more for drag and increasong fuel consumption than anything else I suspect, especially the ones without a scoop on them and face the rear...

Are all the figures you guys quoting measured miles by the odometer and liters put in at the pump, recorded and tabulated, or are they quoted from the reading on the dash?

I wouldn't be trusting the dash readouts. I have found them to be highly inaccurate.

My 2015 4.0L V6 petrol hilux with canopy, roof rack, 270deg awning, running oversize 286 70 R17 Hankook mud tires, all in including town/highway/towing gets me 13.25L/100km on 95/98 recorded at the pump. In standard form, I was getting 11.56L/100km on 91.

My 3.5L V6 Surf (standard on AT tyres) used to go 12.36L/100km on 91, and 11.7L/100km on 95

The forward facing snorkel are designed to force clean air in.
Also a snorkel is meant to increase fuel efficiency.

Originally Posted by 7mmwsm

I'm running a 4.5 litre flat deck cruiser and got 780km for 95 litres on the last tank. By my calculations that's a bit over 8 litres /100 km. About 200 km of that was towing about a tonne.
Quite happy with that. Although I only drive at about 90 km/hour normally.

No that's around 12 litres per 100 by my calculation

Hey bro, mines 2018, manual transmission. Hasn’t got the bullbar etc I’m running some 17” alloys and AT tyres with upgraded suspension.
I commute 30 mins each way for work, half 100kmh half 50kmh zones. Any away trips are mostly open road stuff.
Currently sitting on 10 L flat. Used to be 10.5 L with the old steelie rims.

Originally Posted by zeropak

No that's around 12 litres per 100 by my calculation

Indeed.

I think we need to also get a bit of a reality check going here.

Measuring fuel consumption is a relatively exact science. As I mentioned earlier and as mentioned by @hotbarrels above, just going on the dashboard readout it can be highly misleading.

A calibrated OBD2 scanner readout is the only way to get an accurate number that gives you not just reliable consumption but reliable range. Trust me on that, having relied on one to get me from one remote outback bowser to the other in the absolute back of beyond, you need to know that it is telling you the truth. Or else you are in deep shit.

In many instances of casually quoted figures of fuel consumption, you can find a hole in the way the guy has come up with the number. So when we are comparing numbers we are definitely not comparing apples to apples. Some fellas can’t even do the sum right (no offence).

Then there is the issue of pages and pages and pages of fleet data for a large number of vehicles (hundreds), over a long period of time. The data does not lie. You can tell the difference between different drivers of the same vehicle, when one driver was rostered on for two weeks and the other was rostered off. The heavy right foot syndrome of the one stands out like dogs balls, no matter that he’s driving in exactly the same conditions on exactly the same route day after day. Some of the numbers that get quoted for certain vehicles are simply unbelievable when compared to fleet data that calculates an average over the service life of the vehicle. There’s been a couple of those in this thread so far.

It’s a take it or leave it thing, I guess my point is don’t pull your hair out over a problem you might not have in the first place.

Toyota motors in utility vehicles have never been the most fuel efficient, in fact they’re usually at the top of the thirsty list. But no matter what the freaks might claim, they have always been the most reliable, across the widest range of applications, for the longest period, fact. And that is because in stock form they are detuned for longevity and reliability, and matched to very sturdy drivetrains and chassis.

What you lose at bowser in the form of a relatively small percentage of higher fuel consumption needs to be considered over the life of the vehicle in your ownership. If you have just coughed up thousands in bling (understandably), then clearly there is going to be a weight and aerodynamic penalty, the flipside being you are now tooled up to go and do some really cool shit in even cooler places. I say it is a reasonable trade off.

Final point. I do not recommend an ECU remap (and for fuck‘s sake never a chip) if you want to maintain that legendary longevity.

(and now cue the owners of ancient rust bucket wagons to tell us how their old bangers are clearly better options especially now they are going up in value… for every one of those stories against the modern common rail engines I have the experience and fleet data that demonstrates routine achievement of 300 - 400,000 km in three years by bog standard Hilux in Outback iron ore mining conditions that make NZ look like Wiltshire.)

Thanks for all the input so far. Interesting to see the numbers from others. Honestly i’m not convinced that 13L to 100 is to be expected. I fully understand that it will be a chunk more due to the mods but I really can’t rationalise it being that much. I know of a few other trucks with mates very similar with bullbars winches snorkels and big muds etc that don’t run this thirsty. Talking to my mate today who has a lifted amarok with winch, bullbar, snorkel, 33” big mud terrain tyres and when I told him what I was getting his jaw dropped as he’s on 10.2L… It’s early days and maybe it needs to be really run in and get some hard working km on the clock. 11 - 12 I can accept as an increase over the stated 7.9 in specifications but shit 13.. should have just bought a landcruiser hahah