I don’t feel so bad about my bus getting 25L/100km (9.41mpg) now, Which is pretty good for a 1989 model bus. That’s with a 9.6 Litre Inline 6 Turbo Diesel as well more specifically the Volvo THD101GC donk and ZF 4HP500 4 speed auto in a 11,100kg Tare 16,500kg GVM bus (24,471 pounds empty, 36,376 pounds Max loaded weight with 57 passengers 1 driver).
Your fuel economy will always go down, this is normal wear and tear as the upkeep rarely happens in school districts, if the engine was well taken care of, the bus' MPG rating by Thomas (Or International (Intertrashional), or BlueBird) will stay ROUGHLY about the same, and it's a very big vehicle with a Diesel, so MPG rating will always look bad, it's not like a Prius that gets 30 MPG or so, or a Ford Fiesta with a 3cyl that gets 65 MPG HWY. Diesels are NOTORIOUS for crappy fuel economy, so that's a problem by itself, the bigger the engine, the more fuel it needs to function. Then there's other factors like load on the alternator, AC condenser (if in the engine bay, in which case, may God have mercy on your soul, I've had bad experience with C2s as a student, the AC broke *VERY* often, and it's AZ spec'd), power steering (if applicable), and so on and so forth. And yes, if you accelerate hard, that can also negatively impact fuel economy, at least Diesel's cheaper than gasoline (or petrol for those overseas). Happy School Bus Driving!
It still probably wouldn’t break double digits these things aren’t geared for the highway they are geared for frequent stops and starts the engine is just singing on the highway
One tip is to never idle it like UPS, the instant the bus is in park at a school or other location where it will be for more than a few seconds shut it off, turn it back on only when you're about to drive off, you might break 10 using this method, local bus company does this with their MaxxForce buses because they don't want them anymore and corporate is too cheap to phase them out even when the diff makes a racket more deafening than the sans muffler exhaust, already killed 3 this way, all with the MaxxForce 7 or MaxxForce DT, have yet to see a VT365 blow up though those have all been bulletproofed and make stupid power since they've all been emissions deleted, they will pin you to your seat no problem
Really not surprised. the following is from assuming your bus has the 4 cylinder Detriot dd 5 diesel engine and not the cummins. They claim the four cylinder diesel has better gas mileage. however the measurements are only made without kids on the bus or some other setting with less weight. They also claim in general sometimes that a 4 cylinder has better milage. A stressed engine will get terrible mileage.
Our Company here in Germany bought VDL Citeas. Some ugly ass busses but they have the best gas mileage i've ever seen... Around 19 Liter per 100 km. Makes about 12,7 Miles a Gallon i guess.
I have a 2012 f-250 originally I was getting 12 mpg with emissions after I deleted my egr and dpf system and put a tune on it I’m getting around 15-25 mpg
Do not idle whenever possible, make sure your air pressure is at the correct pressure, and don't hammer on the throttle. My semi truck get like 9.5 MPG with a X15 Cummins
Bruh wtf , my car gets 76 miles per gallon and there is a bmw sports car which gets 101 mpg How are all of y’all’s vehicles getting no miles per gallon
