The 1.6 Diesel Passat on its way to the 1,527 mile record, measured by a VBOX Mini
A VBOX Mini has provided The Sunday Times UK National Newspaper with the crucial evidence needed to break a Guinness World Record, as featured in the ‘In Gear’ section of the paper on Sunday.
It was for the longest distance travelled by a production car on a single tank of fuel. Using a Volkswagen Passat Bluemotion 1.6 diesel, the team drove from the south coast of the UK to the South of France and (almost) back before running out of fuel after 47 hours and 47 minutes, and 1,526.63 miles.
Gavin Conway, a Sunday Times journalist, drove the entire route, accompanied by a navigator and video crew. Two AA patrolmen followed throughout the journey, acting as independent witnesses. The route was mostly along autoroutes, but included some town driving, resulting in an average speed of 45mph
Following the attempt, Darran Shepherd, Racelogic’s Technical Support manager, used the VBox to calibrate the Passat’s odometer. This revealed a correction factor of 0.9978 needed to be applied to the reading, chopping five miles off the distance recorded. The car still beat the previous record, by more than 67 miles.
A letter certifying the odometer’s accuracy was submitted to Guinness World Records as part of a detailed package of evidence, along with the data from the VBox, which was exported to a spreadsheet, as well as into Google Maps to provide a map of the route.
The attempt took place in August, but was only published in The Sunday Times on 3 October after Guinness World Records had confirmed the new world record. which had been held for eight years by John and Helen Taylor, an Australian couple who drove 1,459 miles in a diesel Peugeot 406 from Melbourne to Rockhampton, Queensland. The pair offered their “hearty congratulations” on the new record.
“This is what it’s about for us,” said John. “Encouraging everyone on the planet to go out and break records and learn how they can save fuel.”
The Passat was chosen for the record because of its fuel economy and 70 litre fuel tank. The caractually held 77.25 (16.99 gallons) litres of diesel when brimmed, delivering almost 90 mpg at a cost of 6.17p per mile.
