Kia Sorento diesel - fuel consumption when not towing???

[soldlisa04]

Hi there, thinking of getting the above as a tow car (Swift Challenger 570) - know it's a great towcar but can anyone tell me what the MPG is when not towing. I drive to work which is a 14 mile round trip every day. Any thoughts on Kia as a tow car would be much appreciated - either manual or auto. Cheers Lisa

 

[birdman101]

You do not state what model and year whether latest sorento or previous model.

 

[soldlisa04]

Oops sorry - we are thinking it will probably be an 05 55 or 06 plate, no newer.

 

[Dustydog]

Lisa
Everything you ever wanted to know about a Sorie is on here:-
http://kiasorento.proboards.com/index.cgi?
Driving gently I get 32mpg on motorqways dual carriageways. Town driving in stop start it drops. Towing at 56mph on a motorway I get 26-28 depending on the gradients.

 

[birdman101]

I have auto pre 06. From 06 reg the road tax on auto is approx double that of pre 06, thats why i still have mine, also as it is the best towcar i have had in nearly 40 years of caravanning.Fuel figures vary on type of solo journey.Longish run on dual carriagaways and motorways 32-34 ,A roads bends and hills 27-28, round Milton Keynes short journeys 24.towing long journeys 22-23.Hope this of help,manual would be slightly better but as in Milton Keynes we have roundabouts every 400yds and my main reason is for towing i would not change it.My wife has auto Picanto for shopping round town and would not go back to manual.

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

I have an 06 Auto and as a tow car I'd thoroughly recommend it. I haven't a clue what MPG I get but I've never bothered working that out ever since I've been driving. As long as I can afford to fill it up it's ok, when I can't it goes

In fairness we don't use the car that much, only locally when at home. Our main use comes with towing and when we are away in the van which has worked out at about 16 weeks this year. What I do like about the Sorento is the cruise control because we do a lot of towing on motorways and dual carriageways whenever possible.
Recently I've had my car serviced & MOTd and the chap who services it advised me to hang on to the car and the garage mechanic said that underneath theres no rust, oil marks or chips and it's just like it's just come out of the showroom.
The Sorento is just as comfortable as the Passat which I had before and is far more stable when towing. I've especially noticed this when coming up behind car transporters. With the Passat you could feel the van start to wobble but with the sorento there's none of that.
After the Passat being an auto I wanted a Sorento auto and I love it. I will never go back to manual.

 

[birdman101]

My thoughts are exactly as the lords, as a family we have sorento, rio and picantos totalling 6 kias in all.They are all good as new underside and no oil leaks, like i had with my previuos dicovery which i also bought new and had oil leaks from the day i bought it, which was never cured and also had a new transferr gearbox at 6 days old.The kia is a well built car.

 

[drsorento]

I have a diesil manual on a run it returns 30 mpg solo.
The sorrento is a brilliant car all round its towing ability is outstanding, but economical it aint, I always say that if you are in the least bit concerned about fuel ecomomy the sorento is not for you.
I would not be without mine, even if i gave up the caravan tomorrow I would keep the sorento.

 

[soldlisa04]

Hi all, just to say we bought an 06 Kia Sorento diesel and collected it this Sat - just as the first few flakes of snow started to fall. Getting used to it at the moment - making me feel a bit sick as it is a bouncy ride, but I am loving being higher up, so better vision. Our old car was the same year, so same age - was a bit uncomfortable about paying more for an older car than we had but so far this one seems to be very good - few more miles on the clock than our old car too but these are built to be workhorses and we had seen some for sale with 234k miles on clock (ours has 86k on it). It had one owner from new, full Kia service history and I don't think they can have had kids as the back seat area looks unused! Got to get used to no reversing sensors but easy enough to fit (save up first!), no bluetooth but remedied that swiftly with an LG device on offer in Tescos and no outside temperature guage which, short of strapping a thermometer to outside of car, will have to do without! Looking forward to our first towing experience and filling tank up full to see what the fuel usage is like.

 

[otherclive]

I hope that you enjoy it. We had our 04 for seven years without anything going wrong. Even now my wife bemoans the fact that I sold it as she enjoyed the higher driving position. In last months 4x4 magazine it got a high accolade as beinga pretty bombproof second hand car. When I bought mine the Sorento had just beaten the new Disco 3 as their car of the year, even beating the Disco on some of the off-road rounds. But to be fair LR had supplied the D3 fitted with road orientated tyres whereas the Sorento had ATs fitted. Although I took our Sorento out on anumber of off-road days and even had an Asfir underbody kit imported in from Israel, and her underbody breathing vents routed higher up for wading..good fun,but not cheap.

 

[Dustydog]

Lisa
Is it an XE, XS or XT?
The latter two have an outside temperature guage.
I fitted both front and rear parking sensors years ago. Wouldn't be without them.
See this:- http://www.parkingsensors.co.uk/

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

Lisa
Is it an XE, XS or XT?
The latter two have an outside temperature guage.
I fitted both front and rear parking sensors years ago. Wouldn't be without them.
See this:- http://www.parkingsensors.co.uk/

Mines an 06 XS but no outside temperature guage DD much to Her Ladyships disgust. I can do without that though as long as I've got the auto transmission and cruise control

 

[Dustydog]

Lisa
Is it an XE, XS or XT?
The latter two have an outside temperature guage.
I fitted both front and rear parking sensors years ago. Wouldn't be without them.
See this:- http://www.parkingsensors.co.uk/

Mines an 06 XS but no outside temperature guage DD much to Her Ladyships disgust. I can do without that though as long as I've got the auto transmission and cruise control

LB You have the same model as me , the pre face lift XS. Look at your climate control panel. Beneath the display on the right hand side is a button marked AMB. With the ignition/ engine switched on the display will read the climate temperature selected. However if you press AMB once it will display the outside temperature for between 5 to 10 seconds.
Hope it works for you.

 

[soldlisa04]

Hi there DD - mine must be a pre face lift XS but I will try the above. Will copy and paste this for my husband to fiddle with. Thanks also for the info about the parking sensors - he's already earmarked them from that website as £100 cheaper than what he was originally going to purchase. Cheers everyone - much appreciated for your comments.

 

[soldlisa04]

Yay found the outside temp as per the instructions - many thanks. Am happy now as I know how cold it is

sad aren't I????

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

Am happy now as I know how cold it is

sad aren't I????

Yes, this must be a female trait

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

BTW I've just told Her Ladyship that we should be able to get the outside temperature as she's now as happy as the proverbial and I'm now set up for the day

To top it off we are out tonight to see a Roy Orbison/Traveling Wilbury's tribute band. Seen Barry Steele before as the Bog O and if you close your eyes you can't tell the difference. He's brilliant. He's on You Tube.

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

LB You have the same model as me , the pre face lift XS. Look at your climate control panel.

Thanks for that DD and thanks to Parksy for passing on your email

What I will say though is you must give me chance to get used to all the gubbin's on the Sorento because I've only had it 3 years. I'm still not fully conversant with the ATC yet

Just be thankful I'm not an airline pilot

p.s. I am going out soon so I will try it then but I didn't know about this because in the handbook, page 4-60 it says about a Tempmeter (if fitted). This I have tried and the outside temperature doesn't show on this so I assumed it was only on the XT version.

 

[Dustydog]

Very pleased Her ladyship is happy, hopefully plenty of Brownie points later.
Roy Orbison look alike? Showing your age now LB.
Sadly I too have to put up with tribute bands. The Think Floyd are excellent and sound just like the real Floyd. Even their light show is great. I saw an Abba tribute a few years back and they too performed very well. A sign of the times I guess. There again Floyd's Dave Gilmour will be 66 next month so perhaps I'm being a bit mean expecting him to play every week at the local town hall like they did years ago.

My Sorie's super ambient temperature guage says it's minus 3degs here. Are you sure you weren't reading your handbook upside down

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

Very pleased Her ladyship is happy, hopefully plenty of Brownie points later.

I take it all back because now she isn't very happy. She's complaining that it makes her arm ache holding the button in all the time

 

[Brian_374234561]

we only get 22mpg solo as it's only driven around town clocking up a massive 3k miles per annum. Towing our Carolina, fully laden, with 3 kids, dog and bikes on the roof it drops to 19mpg but I do have a heavy right foot! So not brilliant, but I didnt buy it for the fuel economy - purely for towing a large 'van safely and it does that brilliantly

 

[lloydrad]

I'm really surprised at the you got almost 19 mpg and 22 mpg if you are in a winter fuel blend area on the highway at 80 and 70. I might do around 20 mpg on a long haul in the summer with my truck that is similar except it is 4x4. I usually average around 12 mpg in the summer towing in the 60-65 range. I just topped off my tank with a mix of highway and town driving with winter fuel and averaged about 12-13 mpg with no towing.

 

[DianneT]

My husband says he gets 36 mpg on a long run and 23 mpg towing an 8 metr caravan. The car is and 05 Sorento KS Diesel Automatic. We have had it 6 years and love it to bits.

 

[soldlisa04]

Dianne - all we seem to have done since picking up the car on 4th Feb is fill it with diesel but I suppose I am being a bit more sensitive to it as it's still a new car to us and we haven't really towed our caravan any further than Broadway which was about 34 miles, most of which was motorway. I keep trying to tell myself that it's a bigger engine and heavier car than our previous but am still mindful of the expense of fuel and the fact that it will only keep going up! It's going to cost more to fill than previous car as it's a bigger fuel tank but it has made us think if our journey is really necessary and could we walk. We are also looking at other ways to shave a bit off costs so that there is the money there to fill the car up for our many weekends, and 4 weeks away we have planned for the summer/autumn this year. I suppose that we will have to give it the whole season to see what our costs are as a whole, but as my OH points out, it's still a lot cheaper than our 10 day holiday in a villa in Cyprus last year when you add the cost of everything in (well, we all needed some new clothes and shoes!!!).
I must admit to enjoying driving a higher more solid car and feel safer. I just wish the Government would give a bit of thought to all of us who actually pay for our fuel as it's far becoming more expensive than food at this rate!

As our neighbour pointed out - the fuel consumption in our previous car would have risen dramatically towing our van so perhaps it swings and roundabouts all the way!

 

[birdman101]

Mine is Auto so will do slightly less than manual,but at 22-23 towing i am quite happy as it tows effortless.I have towed for 40 years and it is still the best tow car i have had, superior to a Discovery i bought previosly. Solo can vary between 27 -34. When i towed with petrol cars up to 18 years ago i only got 20 mpg towing. I am afraid it is the cost of doing what you want.