Ratbag's 2006 Fox XS - Roo2

Gidday Folks

Guess I should start a journal. Seems a goodly system of keeping this stuff organised ... :poke: :lol:.

Anyway, I have fitted the OEM roof bars and Rola basket to Roo2 in the last couple of days.


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Took it for a spin into town today on the Nepean Highway.

From about 70 km/h, it started to purr.

By about 80 km/h, the purr had become a more of a roar ... :( :(.

This will drive me NUTS, in short order ... Fortunately, it is my intention to fit the basket to the lid on my rebuilt trailer, where it should be out of the wind, and the noise should be well behind me ....

Will keep you posted about all this ... :iconwink: ;) :raspberry:
 
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Ratbag said:
May I suggest that you change your insurance to "agreed value" for the precise reason you mentioned?
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They won't do an agreed value and I've always insured my cars for market value. I'm happy to live with that. It does worry me more about our 15 year old, 342,000km Camry though which is worth a lot more to us than the market value (if it actually does have one :lol: ) $300 a year makes me thing that it's probably not worth insuring or maybe just for 3rd party property for when my wife runs into a Merc or BMW.
 
guzzla said:
$300 a year makes me thing that it's probably not worth insuring or maybe just for 3rd party property for when my wife runs into a Merc or BMW.
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Guzzla, I have thought exactly the same thing, but when I tried to insure only for third party property damage, it was actually more expensive than the comprehensive policy that I already had, so I stuck with it. 300 a year is peace of mind!
 
guzzla said:
They won't do an agreed value and I've always insured my cars for market value. I'm happy to live with that. It does worry me more about our 15 year old, 342,000km Camry though which is worth a lot more to us than the market value (if it actually does have one :lol: ) $300 a year makes me thing that it's probably not worth insuring or maybe just for 3rd party property for when my wife runs into a Merc or BMW.
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Yeah. Over 35 years ago, the driver's side door on a Rolls Royce cost $2,500 ...

We got $2,500 trade in for our Camry (18 y.o.; 170,000 kms; unroadworthy, and therefore unsaleable, because of the oil leaks ... ).

I won't insure with any company that doesn't offer an agreed sum policy on vehicles less than 10 y.o. ...
 
More on fuel economy

Yesterday a mate and I went on another photography expedition, this time to Ballarat Wildlife Park.

Filled up just after leaving home. Around 15 kms to get on the freeway. On the way back, we spent around 20+ minutes idling in traffic in St Kilda, and another 19 kms after leaving the freeway. Roof bars on Roo2.

Filled up this morning, needle showing a bit over half full (i.e. more than 3/5ths fuel left in the tank ... ).

23.0 litres for 272 kms. 8.45L/100 kms. :ebiggrin: :biggrin:

That's almost exactly 0.5L/100 kms better than I got out of Roo1 driving to Brisbane last year!

By dead reckoning, on the way back the needle intersected the 3/4 full mark at exactly 160 kms. That's 12L for 160 kms = 7.5L/100 kms!!. The traffic jam in St Kilda would have knocked that around a tad.

The previous tank included the run up to Healesville, plus another 300 kms around town. I got 10.75L/100 kms average for that tank.

I am very much happier with the economy I am seeing now, compared with my original comments. Almost certainly due to my increasing familiarity with the performance of the car, and my driving of it. Getting used to the electronic throttle probably helps a lot too.
 
Ratbag said:
I am very much happier with the economy I am seeing now, compared with my original comments. Almost certainly due to my increasing familiarity with the performance of the car, and my driving of it. Getting used to the electronic throttle probably helps a lot too.
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Agreed. The more I drive, the better my economy is getting. When I first bought the car (just over a year ago) I was averaging around mid 8's to low 9's.

On Monday this week I drove to Adelaide and back. A distance of just under 1400km, all on major highways. I reset the trip meter when I left, and when I got home, the average economy for the trip was showing 7.2
 
Gidday SJ

sjm said:
Agreed. The more I drive, the better my economy is getting. When I first bought the car (just over a year ago) I was averaging around mid 8's to low 9's.
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I very much suspect that this dictum applies to most things in life, mate ... :iconwink:

On Monday this week I drove to Adelaide and back. A distance of just under 1400km, all on major highways. I reset the trip meter when I left, and when I got home, the average economy for the trip was showing 7.2
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Now that is spectacular.

If I can achieve that sort of economy on the open road, I shall be as pleased as punch :biggrin: :cool:
 
I'm averaging 11 L/100km... and I drive in ways to get it lower as it's pretty damn high.

Probably time to change the O2 sensor I guess...
 
Gidday Fly

Is that on the open road? Or around town?

Around town I'm using between 11 and 12.5L/100 kms. Unless I choose to drive like the idiots I criticise, that's unlikely to change. My life is far too short to spend all day getting up to 60 km/h ... :iconwink: :lol:.

As my open road trips always start with 15-20 kms of urban driving, I expect that the longer the open road trip, the closer I will get to 8L/100 kms, which would be far more than just acceptable to me.

As I said before, Roo1 only managed 8.95L/100 kms on a 4,500 km trip from Melbourne to Brisbane and back late last year. Roo2 weighs about 30% more, is far less streamlined, and has a much bigger and more powerful motor. I am very pleased even getting "only" 6% better economy in Roo2 on a fairly short open road trip :).
 
Ratbag said:
23.0 litres for 272 kms. 8.45L/100 kms. :ebiggrin: :biggrin:
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Thats awesome :monkeydance:

Almost certainly due to my increasing familiarity with the performance of the car, and my driving of it. Getting used to the electronic throttle probably helps a lot too.
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Perhaps the car is also "learning" you, or at least the ECU lol :lol:

sjm said:
When I first bought the car (just over a year ago) I was averaging around mid 8's to low 9's.
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Thats great too :monkeydance:

the average economy for the trip was showing 7.2
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OK, now thats just a bit too good. Some sand bags in the back oughta fix that! :rotfl:

Fly said:
I'm averaging 11 L/100km... and I drive in ways to get it lower as it's pretty damn high.

Probably time to change the O2 sensor I guess...
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Me too mate, but they're bloody expensive! I have doubts about using the Bosch replacement (even though they make the OEM O2 on many makes) as Subies can sometimes be touchy bout things like that, but they are sooo much cheaper. Make sure you post what you get & how it goes
 
Ratbag said:
Is that on the open road? Or around town?
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Just checked my Fuelly to be sure... actually it's worse lol. It's more or less accurate (city vs highway figures) as I always do a bit of both on the same fillup, but it gives an idea. That's since I got my ScanGauge as I'm more careful than I was before.
12.6 overall, 12.7 city, 11.3 highway.
 
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I get between 9-10l to 100km with a mix of driving. This is driving hard too, pretty much flat out accelerating to every speed limit... I am wondering how much my fuel will change when I drop the EJ25 donk in the old girl...
She won't have to work as hard to turn those big tyres so I think it should be similar to what I get now..?

Fly is your Foz auto or manual? Do you drive it hard?
Ratbag that's not too bad economy, you certainly don't nanna drive your car either ;)
 
It's an EJ25 auto. Sometimes I have some fun in the snow :lol: but usually I don't drive it hard at all... I try to save money where I can! I'm pretty happy now that fuel has dropped from $1.40/L down to $1.20 right before my roadtrip tomorrow, but that'd be even better if I did 9L/100km too...

When in down I don't carry much so it can't be caused by weight. Most likely issue is the O2 sensors, I believe, as they appear to be the original ones... after 220 000 km, it's probably time. Spark plugs and air filter have been changed "recently" (respectively 20 000 km and 3000 km ago).
 
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Nachaluva said:
OK, now thats just a bit too good. Some sand bags in the back oughta fix that!
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Bear in mind, it's virtually a brand new car, and fuel economy is a major selling point these days, with manufacturers making an effort to minimise fuel usage. The sticker on the window claims 7.5 for highway driving, but it's not difficult to better that.

And having an instantaneous fuel economy gauge on the dash is useful too - you can see exactly how much you're using in real time, and adjust your driving style accordingly. I'm not sure when this was introduced, but it's a great feature.
 
sjm said:
Bear in mind, it's virtually a brand new car, and fuel economy is a major selling point these days, with manufacturers making an effort to minimise fuel usage. The sticker on the window claims 7.5 for highway driving, but it's not difficult to better that.

And having an instantaneous fuel economy gauge on the dash is useful too - you can see exactly how much you're using in real time, and adjust your driving style accordingly. I'm not sure when this was introduced, but it's a great feature.
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Have you checked how accurate it is by actually measuring how far you have driven and how much fuel you have used? Most of the fuel monitors in most cars are very optomistic. And if it is anything like the speedo or odo it will be very optomistic.
 
guzzla said:
Have you checked how accurate it is by actually measuring how far you have driven and how much fuel you have used?
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Yes, many times. I regularly drive from Melbourne to Mildura, 550km and it takes about 45 litres. That works out to around 8.1, and the display generally shows 8.2. I have no reason to doubt it, especially since the fuel consumption label states 7.5.
 
Well folks,

after 8.6L/100 kms on the (mainly) freeway run to Ballarat and back with two adults and a whole lot of camera gear, I have done a couple of hundred kms around the suburb.

I filled on one of those rare days over Christmas hols when petrol momentarily dropped to 125.4c/L.

The bad news is 12.71L/100 kms.

The only good part of this is that my mate gets around 8.xL/100 kms out of his Statesman V6 on a long open road trip, but tells me that he's lucky to get 15-20 around the suburbs ...

Oh well, I just love the car, and that's far more important to me than a couple of dollars extra per 100 kms ...

Drove RonnyRoo down to Rye today for a friend's 70th. 140 kms on around 10L ...

Seems that both are guzzlers around the suburbs for short trips, but give excellent economy on the open road (considering the size/weight, engine size and power).
 
Nah, mate.

I am not prepared to waste my life getting up to 60 kmh ...

Besides, it doesn't seem to matter how I drive it, the mileage remains much the same doing short trips to the bank, chemist, supermarket and such like - always between about 12.4 and 12.7.

As soon as it sniffs the open road, it is great. 0.5 L/100 kms better than the Impreza, at the very least. Actually 8.455 L/100 on the Ballarat trip, which included about 30 mins stuck in traffic in St Kilda on Beach Rd on the way home ... The Impreza managed 8.95 overall on my trip to Brisbane and back.

When I finally get to drive it to Adelaide sometime in the next month or so, it will be interesting to see what it does on a "real" open road trip.

Have you got your diff plug out yet?
If not, give me a call so we can arrange to try my plug spanner on it.
 
Gidday iT

Interesting to see a longer term comparison.

I only rarely change up below about 3,500-4,000 rpm; often going to the high fives ...

I also only use standard ULP - 90 RON (?).

SWMBO's MY10 auto is much the same weight as her Camry was. It is more powerful (bigger engine and more torque, in particular), has a considerably greater frontal area, yet overall it is more economical. Lousy on short trips to the shops, etc, but so was the Camry.

I flatly refuse to drive using a feather on the accelerator, as some people patently do. Cars are for getting from A to B. This necessarily implies the journey being a reasonable length of time for the distance and conditions, IMHO.

Truth be told, I am surprised at how economical these cars are, given their engine size/power, and body size, weight and frontal area.
 
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