Honda CR-V 1.6i-DTEC does 77.86 mpg in the ‘Real World’

The Honda CR-V 1.6i-DTEC – Honda’s new super-frugal CR-V – has achieved 77.86 mpg in a ‘real world’ test over 500 miles on public roads.

Official car economy figures are pretty useless at being anything other than a guide to the relative economy of cars on sale. But Honda are trying to prove that’s not true.

They’ve taken their new CR-V 1.6i-DTEC – which has official economy of 62.8 mpg – out on a mission to prove it can do even more miles to the gallon in the real world than in official tests.

The test was run over 500 miles on a variety of roads and conditions and at speeds that represent real world driving, with the team behind the ‘MPG Marathon’ organising the test with a pair of independent drivers at the wheel – John Kerswill and Ian McKean.

The results from the test yielded 77.86 mpg – a quarter better than the official numbers – and a remarkable achievement for Honda’s 1.6i-DTEC engine with its 118bhp and emissions of 119g/km.

John Kerswell, one of the drivers, said:

A lot of people doubt that the official consumption figures of new cars are achievable in real life, and with some cars that might be true. But we’ve shown conclusively that it’s possible to not only match but far exceed the CR-V 1.6 i-DTEC’s official 62.8mpg, which is itself a pretty amazing figure for such a large vehicle.

And he’s not wrong – it is a remarkable figure for a decent size car. But…

When the Fiesta Econetic first arrived for review, we tried to match the official economy figures – 76.7mpg – after averaging 55.9mpg during 500 miles of normal driving.

We succeeded in achieving 76.3 mpg, although we were probably a big irritant to other drivers, by driving like hyper-milers and changing gear – despite the Fiesta complaining – whenever the indicator light on the dash told us. So it’s possible.

But no one can go about their normal daily business driving like that, even if it is technically possible to equal or better official economy figures.