Making my Ford Focus ST economical

[seahawk2k]

Hi all. Im new to the site. So take it easy on me lol.

I have a Ford Focus ST (56 Plate). I love the car but it can be thirsty. I have to make a 70 mile round trip commute 5 days a week, I dont use the the ST for this (As i have an old M reg BMW 318 to do this) but i would like to use it more often, rather than just the weeks ends. Are their any suggestions on improving MPG?

Big question really is.......is getting the car converted to LPG going to work? Has any body done this already? Any problems? rough guide of improvments?

Any help or guidance is much appreciated!!

Thanks in advance, Simon

[ClintonB]

1] Accept that the ST isn't exactly Methodist when it comes to consumption.

2] Lighter shoes and a general modification of driving style.

3] A different commute.


The Focus is never going to be great on fuel unless you have a long but empty commute and are shy when it comes to pedal use (of either persuasion). It's a car that's fairly heavy for it's size and has an engine made of pig iron & peasant sweat, the upside being it has a decent chance of lasting a long time.

[lionrampant]

Not done it myself but I've read enough articles on LPG to know it really relies on your yearly mileage, local cost of LPG, etc. Do enough to recoup the initial cost within a year or so and you're laughing. Any more and it gets tricky to justify. Another concern is whether any existing Ford warranty would be nullified by the installation.

Other than that... just drive with a light foot my lad.

[BrassMan]

Tyre pressures?
Much stop-start driving?
Average motorway speed?
Smooth your driving out so that you don't need to brake so much?
Tape up the shutlines?
Remove the furry dice?
Single wiper conversion?

[Colonial]

Sell it an buy a diesel?

The overall package of the ST makes up for the low mpg in my eyes.

[DaveL86]

My suggestions would be:

Weight:
Remove any un-needed weight from the car so child seat on the back seat when not in use etc, if you have any roof rack or similar that can be removed.

After that you'll be looking at removing the spare wheel (if the ST has one) and replacing it with a can of tyre weld or similar, this will have its downsides of if you have a total tyre failure then tyre weld won't be much use.

Aero:
A previously mentioned roof rack/box removal, not only for weight but for aerodynamics.

Driving style:

Learn about "hypermiling" (google it)

Remember that breaking is not efficient, you're scrubbing off speed that cost energy (fuel) to build, so try to drive in a manner that means the only energy spent is on moving off and maintaining speed and then coast to the lights rather than power to them and then stop.

Driving on the motorway at 60-65 mph is NOT illegal (waits for the PH posse to tell me otherwise) you'll be surprised how little time driving at 60 on the motorway adds to your journey (unless your used to driving at 90+ mph normally that is)

[winshent]

Last year i was on a contract and commuted 60 miles per day.. In my 306 dTurbo i used to get 450 - 500 miles per tank when 'thrashing it'...

One time i decided to see how many miles i could get from a tank. I stuck to 60mph on the motorway, and didnt drive hard around town.. managed to do 695 miles!!

60 mph is so dull though !!

With regards to the ST.. i'd say a remap might help..

Edited by winshent on Sunday 28th March 03:33

[DaveL86]

winshent said:

i'd say a remap might help..

Ohh good point!

Although the cost of the remap (usually £300-500) and the immediate increase in insurance premium (depends on age, experence and insurer) would probably negate any saving on fuel from the remap.

[winshent]

You need to shop around for insurance..

Get some quotes before you commit..

Also, some mods that give more low down torque might help..

I run a mk1 Focus RS, have thrown lots of mods on it and now running 295bhp and 305lbft torque and it hasnt really affected mpg.. i think i probably get an extra 20- 30 miles per tank now..

Edited by winshent on Sunday 28th March 04:05

Edited by winshent on Sunday 28th March 04:05

[greygoose]

I used to have an ST and I'm not sure there's a lot you can do to improve the mpg much. There's no spare wheel to lose weight with and there isn't a spare wheel well as the exhaust back box fills that space so I'm not sure where you could put an LPG tank (unless it took some of the boot space)?

I bought a dreamscience flash tuner with four tunes on it, the lowest one was supposed to be for economy (though I never used that one so couldn't tell you if it actually worked or not). I've still got the unit if you want to get in touch about buying it .

[neiljohnson]

winshent said:

You need to shop around for insurance..

Get some quotes before you commit..

Also, some mods that give more low down torque might help..

I run a mk1 Focus RS, have thrown lots of mods on it and now running 295bhp and 305lbft torque and it hasnt really affected mpg.. i think i probably get an extra 20- 30 miles per tank now..

Edited by winshent on Sunday 28th March 04:05

Edited by winshent on Sunday 28th March 04:05

My mods didnt improve my fuel consumption but that is probably down to my driving style

[C2]

I run a 5 pot turbo for my daily drive, slightly different as its in a V70R and was 300hp standard, but I found after having it remapped it actually returned better mpg on a run, I know I'm not the only person to report this either.
Can highly recommend MTE for the remap, they really know what they're doing with these engines.

Its also the only engine I've found driving style makes such a huge difference with, I can average 15mpg if I drive to work like my pants are on fire or 32mpg if I drive Miss Daisy.

Edited by C2 on Sunday 28th March 06:09

[poo at Paul's]

Try some hypermiling techniques. On my 18t golf, I was able to get an average of about 24mpg, up to 29mpg on motorways. But knocking a few mph off your mway speed amde a big difference. Most difference was from a weird technique whereby you accelerate and then coast, then accelerate then coast. Weird, nto that relaxing, but you could keep a 75lpton average by accelrating up to 85, then ocasting down to 65, then back again, and in that car, it made a remarkable distance, with 40mpg being possible!

But you can't do it day in day out without it really getting on your (and others') tits!

[Mclovin]

lol st and economical in the same sentence....

[Hell27]

seahawk2k said:

Hi all. Im new to the site. So take it easy on me lol.

I have a Ford Focus ST (56 Plate). I love the car but it can be thirsty. I have to make a 70 mile round trip commute 5 days a week, I dont use the the ST for this (As i have an old M reg BMW 318 to do this) but i would like to use it more often, rather than just the weeks ends. Are their any suggestions on improving MPG?

Big question really is.......is getting the car converted to LPG going to work? Has any body done this already? Any problems? rough guide of improvments?

Any help or guidance is much appreciated!!

Thanks in advance, Simon

The answer is in the 2nd car. Sell the BMW, and buy either an old diesel or a 1.1 petrol car for much better mpg. If you get the old diesel, say an old Merc 190 2.5d, you can run it on veg oil from the local chippy (as veg oil from supermarkets is now £1.00 per litre).

With the fuel savings, you can afford to run to run the ST a little more. Everyone has made good points about the hyper milling etc, but why would you want to in an ST? you take all the fun out of driving doing things like that!

Edited by Hell27 on Sunday 28th March 12:05

[Colonial]

Indeed. Why buy a car like that and then complain about fuel usage. Enjoy it.

(this may or may not be based on the fact I pay around 65p a litre for 98)

[Chris_w666]

Colonial said:

Indeed. Why buy a car like that and then complain about fuel usage. Enjoy it.

(this may or may not be based on the fact I pay around 65p a litre for 98)

Don't come on here willy waving

[ben_h100]

I also have a Focus ST, great car. The fuel economy and fuel price hikes have started to concern me so last week I tried a little experiment. Change your driving style. I managed to get 33mpg from Swindon to lincolnshire and back. This was over a mix of a roads, dc and motorways. This included a bit of hooning!

The trick is to be smooth with your driving - instead of always planting your foot into the deck apply it gradually. As others have mentioned, cruising at around 70 will help as well.

More specifically, in the ST you need to keep an eye on the boost guage. When cruising along you can get decent mpg by making sure the turbo isn't spinning. It's possible to accelerate with minimal boost but difficult, and boring lol.

[Rawwr]

1) Open the bonnet
2) Locate that thing bolted to the engine that looks like a metallic snail
3) Smash off the aforementioned with a house brick
4) Remove two spark plugs

Sorted.

[roscozs]

Sell it and buy a Golf GTI more economical, better interior, just as fast but with a little less character.