Honda Jazz i-DSI for fuel efficiency
With rising fuel prices, carmakers keep claiming that their cars are the most fuel-efficient.
So, how do customers make sure that what they buy will live up to what is claimed?
Easy. Drive it. Check the fuel consumption at the end of the trip. And be ready to be drenched in sweat.
PT Honda Prospect Motor (HPM), which assembles the popular Honda Jazz, recently staged a “competition” for auto writers using a Honda Jazz with a i-DSI engine, claimed to be the most fuel-efficient in the 1,500cc class.
Previously, PT HPM had organized a similar competition for the media and public, dubbed the Honda Jazz Eco Challenge, but the route mainly used the Jagorawi toll road heading to Lido resort in Sukabumi regency.
Most of the participants were able to achieve fuel efficiency of one liter to more than 40 kilometers (km), some even reaching 50 km per liter (kpl).
Organizers of the Feb. 18 event tried to provide a more “realistic” route by asking participants from 20 publications to navigate Jakarta streets.
PT HPM provided 10 standard, automatic-transmission Honda Jazz i-DSI units. I was paired with Johnny TG from Kompas who owns a Jazz i-DSI, albeit a manual version. My task was to read the map and determine which route we should take, which corner, which intersection and so on: A navigator in short.
The route, on any typical day, would be daunting as it went along major arteries known for chronic jams during peak hours. There were 14 posts along the 71.5-km route where each car received a stamp from a course official.
The exercise started at HPM’s office in Sunter and took a circuitous route through busy areas of the city, before finally heading back to the finish line, also at Sunter.
Upon arrival, officials recorded the tripmeter to calculate the total journey length of an individual car.
Then, in the parking lot, the gas tank would be refilled using a marked container to determine how much fuel was consumed.
It turned out that most participants managed to record fuel efficiency of more than 30 kpl. That came as a surprise to the organizers as they had earlier tested the route several times and could not even achieve 30 kpl.
At the end of the day, Johnny and I managed to record an outstanding fuel efficiency of about 41 kpl.
The secret? Turn off the air conditioning as it will consume more fuel.
What else? Drive smoothly and keep the rev counter stable at around 2,000 rpm, said Johnny. “Do not apply the brakes suddenly. If you have to use the brakes, do it smoothly,” he said.
But, is there anyone out there willing to get soaked in sweat when you can turn on the air-con so easily? The choice is yours.
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