I needed to jam over to St Louis over Memorial Day Weekend to get some furniture I was tired of storing there. U-Haul quoted over $400 to rent a trailer one-way (STL-DEN), but only $19/ day local. So I dragged an empty trailer out there, and drove back loaded. The trailer pulled fine, and I felt like I could have easily cruised at 75MPH all day. I set the cruise on 74MPH indicated, which I figure is pretty close to 70MPH. The drive is mostly pretty flat, with a few rolling hills, but no mountains to worry about.
I was freaked by the way the Jetta drank fuel! I'm used to getting 600 miles out of a tank of mostly-city driving. I was getting fuel lights in the 300 mile range! One time I pulled into a station with less than 400 miles on the trip meter, and it took 16.5 gallons! Yikes-- that's WAY worse than my worst mileage. I was in the 20s for the whole trip. I have PP520 nozzles and a custom Kerma tune, which is a little on the smoky side now, but the car runs fantastic. The worst mileage I've ever seen (w/o trailer) was 32, and the best all-highway tank was 48.
Afraid of even worse mileage, I went slower on the return (laden) trip. I packed about 1000# of hardwood furniture in the trailer, and drove back with minimal stopping. It would get down to half-tank at about 200 miles, which is amazingly bad. I set the cruise for an indicated 67MPH for almost all of the trip, and think I averaged about 29MPG. Evidently, air resistance is super important to FE-- I bet it would have been a lot better if I could stand to go 60 for long periods of time. That is a freaking brutal trip, though. I can't drone on at 15MPH under the speed limit for 16 hours plus-- just can't stand it.
I will say, though-- that Jetta pulled like a tractor. The brakes aren't really up to towing that much weight, but the ALH barely felt it. I would cruise up every hill in 5th, and never even had to think of downshifting. Rolled some pretty serious coal, but I never got any indications that I was getting hot or running bad EGTs. I didn't log anything, and I haven't scanned for codes yet, but the little diesel towed 2000+# around like it was nothing. Very impressed with the performance, even if I was very underwhelmed by the fuel economy.
I was freaked by the way the Jetta drank fuel! I'm used to getting 600 miles out of a tank of mostly-city driving. I was getting fuel lights in the 300 mile range! One time I pulled into a station with less than 400 miles on the trip meter, and it took 16.5 gallons! Yikes-- that's WAY worse than my worst mileage. I was in the 20s for the whole trip. I have PP520 nozzles and a custom Kerma tune, which is a little on the smoky side now, but the car runs fantastic. The worst mileage I've ever seen (w/o trailer) was 32, and the best all-highway tank was 48.
Afraid of even worse mileage, I went slower on the return (laden) trip. I packed about 1000# of hardwood furniture in the trailer, and drove back with minimal stopping. It would get down to half-tank at about 200 miles, which is amazingly bad. I set the cruise for an indicated 67MPH for almost all of the trip, and think I averaged about 29MPG. Evidently, air resistance is super important to FE-- I bet it would have been a lot better if I could stand to go 60 for long periods of time. That is a freaking brutal trip, though. I can't drone on at 15MPH under the speed limit for 16 hours plus-- just can't stand it.
I will say, though-- that Jetta pulled like a tractor. The brakes aren't really up to towing that much weight, but the ALH barely felt it. I would cruise up every hill in 5th, and never even had to think of downshifting. Rolled some pretty serious coal, but I never got any indications that I was getting hot or running bad EGTs. I didn't log anything, and I haven't scanned for codes yet, but the little diesel towed 2000+# around like it was nothing. Very impressed with the performance, even if I was very underwhelmed by the fuel economy.
