X5 4.8is Real world economy please?? 2006ish??

[L9wul]

I've been looking into these as I think they look great but am obviously concerned regarding economy. Could any present owners give me ideas of what general use gives, I refuse to have a car like this and drive like Miss daisy so would like to know if 20+ is acheivable.

PS, I live in the sticks so not much town driving which is another reason I like the 4.8 over a dirty diesel.

Cheers

[cerb4.5lee]

I sold mine in feb after having it 17 months & 15k miles it was returning about 20mpg if i drove it steady & it would drop to 12mpg on my daily commute of 44 miles round trip.

I would use £20 a day in fuel if i drove like i was enjoying myself, the trouble with them is the weight & 4wd drag that makes them thirsty, i think they work better as a second car or if you only do little mileage.

It crippled me on fuel & my wallet didnt cope, so it had to go, but if you have plenty of cash then a V8 daily obviously makes sense & the sound of them is great, i find my 520d touring a better drive than the X5 but its terribly slow in comparision obviously.

I think the 4.8is looks great, mine was in le mans blue & they are really comfortable with a nice high driving position, but everyones says they drive like a car...they dont!

Good luck in your search you get a quality motor for not too much outlay.

[HoHoHo]

Had mine a year - bought for £46k (9 month old ex BMW management car with 2000 miles on the clock) and sold it a year later for £36k - those were the days

32000 miles at 18.6mpg average. Best was 24mpg, worst very,very low teens. I got rid of it and bought a 535D M Sport. Better, faster more economical and more comfortable. I was on very good terms with my local Shell garage and frankly got bored of filling the bloody thing up.

Don't miss it in the slightest and having also had a 3.0D M Sport X5, I'd chose that over a 4.8 all day every day.

[EdR]

I've owned 2 of these in the past (one in 2004 when they first came out, and again from 2008), and have covered over 100,000 miles between them. Round town, fuel economy is predictably bad, however driving like miss daisy (e.g. not over speed limits on motorways) I could get up to around 26-27mpg average on my 150 commute from Wales to Bucks. I also used to do a 60 mile each way commute on primarily small A or B roads, and driving along in traffic at 45mph ish, it would return an average of around 24mpg. To put it in context, I got better economy from my X5 then I did from an Aston Vantage V8, despite the X5 having a bigger engine, 4WD, automatic gearbox, and the aerodynamics of a barn door! Having said that, I took my 1st 4.8is to a track day at Bruntingthorpe, where it returned about 5mpg...

I test drove the 3.0D, 4.4 V8, 4.6is, and 4.8is when I bought my first one, and personally thought the 4.8is was noticeably better than the others in several ways (to the point that I was willing to spend a fair bit more to get one at the time), plus there was next to no difference in MPG between the 3 V8 models, so made sense to go for the most powerful. I'm now driving an E70 4.8 X5, and whilst it is a better car in many ways, the older one had more steering feel and a MUCH better noise, plus a bit more character.

[HoHoHo]

Blimey EdR, with that mpg did you actually start the engine?

The best I did was on a same day round trip to Brussels from West Sussex with the air conditioning off etc etc and I only managed just under 25mpg.

I agree the noise was brilliant, a proper V8 rumble and if I were going for a V8, I'd go for the 4.8iS.

I just wouldn't get another 4.8 X5.

[helix402]

Around 14mpg on the obc. The same as the 4.4.

[AndrewO]

On the motorway at 79mph it does 24mpg, around town it is not good, about 16-18mpg. Town for us is Reading where a 30min across town drive is 25mins sat at traffic lights.

[DanX5]

I've averaged 17.9 mpg over almost 30k over a 4 year period.