new car fuel mileage question here

Hi everyone. Just picked up a 2014 passat tdi! Love the car so far but i have a question on break in period with fuel mileage, considering the car only has 90 miles on it so far seems i have burned 1/4 of a tank diesel this is not making sense to me. Roughly 40 miles were highway and 50 city and the car is saying ave is 24 mpg, does this sound right??? Do i have to get some miles on this thing before i start getting better mpg?? Thanks

Breath in, breath out…drive.

Doubt it was filled all the way at the dealer. New Passats are notorious for being difficult to fill completely, and with the new fuel restrictor they're harder still.

Good rule of thumb is to average FE over a minimum of three complete tanks of fuel. So you've got a ways to go. And the MFI will take a bit of time to settle down, so don't read too much into that either.

Many people say you should not pay any attention to FE for the first 5,000 miles. Few of us can resist that, but give the car at least 1,000 miles before reading into the data you get.

My colleague has a '13 Passat and just got close to 50 MPG driving up to Vermont in 20 degree weather with snow tires on it. Good numbers are in your future, give it some time.

Sounds good Indigo!!!! Trust me ive tried to ignore the FE but its hard. Im sure it will be fine, i have a bad habbit of over analyzing things, lol. Thanks for the info!

There is usually a lot of idling time on the first tank from test drives and pre delivery.

When you fill it for the first time yourself, reset the #2 mfi settings. Then you can get a better approximate of how it's doing. The #2 will automatically reset after about 5000 miles or about 100 hours IIRC, but tells avg mph, total time, total miles and avg mpg over that period. It's not as accurate as hand calculations but very close.

For now congrats and enjoy the new TDI.

trying to fill accurately is also tough as well. I wait 10 seconds after the nozzle clicks off- I do this three times otherwise you could be a few quarts over/short if you don't fill the same way every time. Here is my record with easy hyper mile style driving down the flat valley roads at 45-55MPH in 6th gear mostly manual mode- It should be noted that manual math resulted in 58 miles per gallon but still amazing!

Thanks for all the input guys!

Drive 50,000 miles. Then take the average over three tanks. That should give you a good indication of what you will get over the next 300,000 miles! Drive more, worry less.

Yup, you need in the order of 50K miles behind you before your car will start to give you fuel economy it's gonna deliver for the next 350K.

It's Winter, you're in Ohio, which is approximately the same latitude I live at. Your mileage will be low now because of the cold weather, and, as has been stated, you will realize better fuel efficiency once the car has some miles on it.
We took a short trip last week, started out in the morning with the temperatures in the teens and drove 100 miles = 38.5 mpg. Were at our destination about 4 hours, drove home the same route, same speed with the temperature in the 30's, and the engine not completely cold when starting = 46.7 mpg.
Notice from my Fuelly below that the car is getting better mileage on average than its EPA highway sticker.

Ditto...keep driving. If you drive it for fuel economy the car will really deliver...just need some time to get her broken in.

Just don't baby it to much. Here is post that give good advice on how to break the engine in

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showpost.php?p=464230&postcount=2

And you are in Ohio, it's cold now, that's going to really take it's toll. My normal 42-44 over the tank is down to around 32-34 here in Michigan. When the weather warms, it immediately shoots right back up.

If that 90 miles is over more than 2 ignition cycles, the cold weather has a big impact. One morning I started my car in garage at about 25*F. Drove 26 miles to work at -14 to -5*F. It took 20 miles to warm up and break 25mpg and ended at 32mpg for average consumption 1. So like pparks, I'm at 33mpg the last few fills vs. 40-ish in the fall.

You are not likely to have as poor fuel economy as this winter. It will improve over the next 50-80k miles so next winter will be better. Unless it is even colder which seems unlikely.

90 miles is not fair to judge. Fill it up now, reset trip 2 data, drive more worry less.

Not saying you should worry--all the comments above are valid--but check out the break-in thread to make sure you're doing things right. If you haven't had a TDI before and/or haven't read your owner's manual or other guidance, it's possible you're doing something wrong. Most of us get pretty good mileage right off the dealer's lot. No harm in educating yourself based on the experience of TDI gurus.

Thank you everyone for the good advice! I am going to disregard this tank and make sure i top it off with the 10 second 3 click method. Sure the weather being like alaska here and my 30 mile round trip commute to work have something to do with the MPG. But for now im just going to kick back and enjoy the car!!! Oh any recommendations on a fair priced but good quality bike roof rack?

Summer time and warm weather is when the Passat TDI really shines.

As mentioned, your initial tank probably wasn't completely full and there could have been quite a bit of idle time.

I recommend tracking your fuel economy at http://www.fuelly.com

VW's does not recommend roof racks for the 2012+ Passat. People have done it with varied success. Most bike owners chose a trailer receiver and hitch mounted carrier.

And expect that to hinder your economy as well.