Record - Passat does 2456km on a tank

Published May 9, 2012

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Driving from Joburg to Durban and back on a single tank is an achievement enough on its own but imagine doing that trip twice without filling up.

Sounds virtually impossible on a standard tank but an American couple recently achieved a similar distance, in the process breaking the world record for longest distance on one tank of diesel.

John and Helen Taylor managed to cover 2456km between Houston, Texas, and Sterling, Virginia, without filling the tank of the Volkswagen Passat 2.0 TDI they were driving.

This equates to an average fuel consumption of 2.8 litres per 100km in what they call real world driving conditions and with ultra-low sulphur diesel. They travelled with 54kg of luggage and drove during the day to experience normal traffic, but there is no indication of how fast (or slow, for that matter) they were going.

The trip took them three days and they didn't drive for more than 14 hours on any of the days. If they had driven for that exact amount of time on each day their average speed would have been just 58.47km/h.

The couple are certainly not amateurs in the art of economical driving. In fact, they've made a career out of hosting workshops on fuel-efficient driving techniques and have racked up more than 90 economy and driving-related world records.

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