colin Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 Matrix Meanderer - 2011-12-29 8:50 AM My 2.3L Fiat is manual with cruise control. How to save money? be very selective when you use cruise control. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matrix Meanderer Posted December 29, 2011 Author Share Posted December 29, 2011 Agree with Derek - driving an MH in the UK does not compare with the joy of France, Germany or even Belgium! If you want the cheapest diesel it has to be Luxembourg. We traded our caravan for a Motorhome after one horrendous tug on the M25 coming back from a serene holiday in France. I vowed never to tow a caravan again after the aggressive lorry drivers, side wind and heavy rain made the journey memorable for all the wrong reasons. At least with a 7.4m large white box the lorry drivers are a bit easier to deal with and you can eyeball them at their level! Even so UK MH driving on conjested, poorly maintained roads with boy racers will never compare with many countries 'on the continent'. We've already booked our first ferry trip in February! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BGD Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 Clive - 2011-12-29 10:26 AM Fiat showcased the Comformatic auto gearchange system at Dussledorf for the smaller engines at the last show and I covered it in MMM at that time. It has been available for some months. Re engine re-tuning, re-chipping or performance enhancements there are a few basic questions you need to answer for yourself 1 Do I really believe that my engine can be re-tuned to give better economy without compromising performance? (If so why do manufacturers not do so and governments not insist upon it? 2 Will it compromise my vehicle warranty? (Like hell it will if the engine goes BANG) 3 Can it make the engine deliver more power?. Yes without doubt. 4 Will it increase the emissions from my engine?. Yes without doubt. 5 Am I likely to use the extra power and torque it will deliver? Yes without doubt especially on hills when you will not need to change gear as frequently. 6 Will the increased power put more strain on the engine and transmission?.Yes without doubt. 7 Will the engine life be compromised? Yes without doubt.. 8 Is reliability or spotiness the most important criteria for a motorhome engine? Its reliability for me. 9 Would you ever have an engine sooped up then? Yes for a FUN vehicle which comes with an acceptance of increased risk, but not for my bl..dy motorhome or anything that I need to rely on! 10 Then you may also need to consider uprating the clutch, brakes, suspension, cooling etc. Have I been there. YES but not for our motorhome. C. . Clive - Good post. As an aside, I too would rather have reliability than spotiness in my MH engine. (Is there a cure if your engine gets spotty? Can you influence what colour the spots might be?) ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clive Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 Red ones, they are the same colour as the mist! C. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matrix Meanderer Posted December 29, 2011 Author Share Posted December 29, 2011 Clive - 2011-12-29 10:26 AM Fiat showcased the Comformatic auto gearchange system at Dussledorf for the smaller engines at the last show and I covered it in MMM at that time. It has been available for some months. Re engine re-tuning, re-chipping or performance enhancements there are a few basic questions you need to answer for yourself 1 Do I really believe that my engine can be re-tuned to give better economy without compromising performance? (If so why do manufacturers not do so and governments not insist upon it? 2 Will it compromise my vehicle warranty? (Like hell it will if the engine goes BANG) 3 Can it make the engine deliver more power?. Yes without doubt. 4 Will it increase the emissions from my engine?. Yes without doubt. 5 Am I likely to use the extra power and torque it will deliver? Yes without doubt especially on hills when you will not need to change gear as frequently. 6 Will the increased power put more strain on the engine and transmission?.Yes without doubt. 7 Will the engine life be compromised? Yes without doubt.. 8 Is reliability or spotiness the most important criteria for a motorhome engine? Its reliability for me. 9 Would you ever have an engine sooped up then? Yes for a FUN vehicle which comes with an acceptance of increased risk, but not for my bl..dy motorhome or anything that I need to rely on! 10 Then you may also need to consider uprating the clutch, brakes, suspension, cooling etc. Have I been there. YES but not for our motorhome. C. . Agree - Excellent post! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Kirby Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 Agree with Clive. These engines are set up to be driven hard over long mileages without problem, under a variety of climatic conditions, burning just basic diesel. When converted to motorhomes they are always heavy compared to the panel vans on which they are generally based, so work harder than those vans, especially when in fully laden "holiday" mode. Their characteristics can be altered to improve power, torque or fuel consumption, but they will still have to do the same work to shift the van. Adding torque allow you to hang on to a higher gear for longer going uphill. Whether that is good I doubt, changing down would be kinder to the engine. Adding HP allows the engine to develop more total power, so may increase the cruising speed, but you will now use more fuel and the engine will run hotter: it has to, it is doing more work. Tuning for better fuel consumption will achieve that objective, but diesel fuel is a lubricant and a coolant within the engine, so again, the manufacturer's selected set of compromises is being skewed with the result that the lean burning engine will develop more heat internally. Barry Norris comments, in terms, that the mods he had carried out will probably not have a cumulative impact on engine life because of the relatively low mileages motorhome engines cover. Maybe, but I'm not sure it will necessarily work out like that. One heavily laden motorhome, on a hot day, on a slow, twisting, high altitude, Alpine road, will be already exploring the outer limits of its mechanical design parameters, and will be running very hot. It will also probably be an operating environment with which an average UK driver will be unfamiliar, unlike the locals, who would be more likely to modify their driving technique to suit. Add a couple of tuning tweaks and it seems to me quite possible that some aspect of the design will be overtaken by the demand, and something will go wrong. Probably it will just begin overheating, and will just need a little rest to recover, but why take the risk? One thing that has impressed me with our earlier Ducato based van, and the present Transit based van, is that even under such extreme conditions the temperature gauge has just sat in the middle of the normal range. True the fans have been running flat out at times, but they have so far had the power to shift the heat even when fully stressed. Tuning tweaks seem to me bound to erode that resilience, and by enhancing performance, will make it difficult for the driver to appreciate when s/he is simply pushing things too far. Our van is for exploring, and it has visited a few hot, hilly, high, places so far without problem. I shouldn't want to upset its ability to continue doing this for the sake of a few extra HP, a bit more torque (especially this, it's FWD and can already spin its front wheels with aplomb! :-)), or a few extra MPG. Besides, I reckon a modern diesel is just about run in at 12,000 miles and will continue improving and loosening to around 20,000 miles. That, if you really want to, is probably the best time to fiddle with its settings, because it will by then be running just that bit cooler. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clive Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 Just an aside, At one of the shows one of the currently prominent companies offering engine boosting did offer me (I guess knowing that I get into print from time to time) a free re-map to provide more power, torque, acceleration etc. That made me think, all this for free! And they would do it on the show site. But when I had thought about it I still said NO for purely engineering reasons. I was not prepared to take the risk. Any guarantees these companies give will only go as far as your money back. If you need a new engine I guess you won,t see them for dust!. C. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Leake Posted December 30, 2011 Share Posted December 30, 2011 One of the things that is often overlooked is that chipping a car engine is normally fine. You will get the extra power but will only use it for short periods when accelerating. Do the same to a motorhome and you could be using that extra power for long periods up hills and into head winds etc. If you are using cruise control you will not even be aware you are doing it. As I said in a previous post I know of two drivers who have managed to blow chipped engines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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