Maintains its own speed in 5th & 6th gear...without cruise control

I noticed something odd today. Driving along a flat road in 6th gear, about 30 miles an hour. Took my foot off the accelerator to allow the car to slow down on its own to allow traffic to clear ahead of me and the car carried on at the same constant speed for the next mile until I had to brake. I thought it might have been a fluke so tested it out a few more times on my journey home. 4th gear and below, it just loses speed until it judders ready to stall. But in 5th and 6th the revs seems to maintain themselves to stop the car from stalling....kept itself to 30 miles an hour. I wasn't using cruise control and Id been driving for more than 30 minutes up until then so the car was up to good temperature. I've never noticed this in any other car I've owned, but this is my first 4x4....so is this typical / expected?

I could be wrong but I think someone explained this is a feature of diesel engines

The torque will likely keep it going but it also has anti-stall which at 6th gear doing 30mph would keep it running too rather than chugging to a stop under 1000rpm

The Evoque diesels will drive at tickover speed and no throttle applied in all gears. Its designed that way

(16-01-2013 09:38am)speary Wrote:  The Evoque diesels will drive at tickover speed and no throttle applied in all gears. Its designed that way

What do you mean by designed that way? Either an engine has enough torque on Idle to cruise continually or it needs the throttle pressed to use fuel to generate more torque to avoid stalling, the Evoque will activate the throttle idle to try and continue running rather than stall, within the limits of the engine and conditions, it will eventually stall if you demand too much torque from the engine at low rpm.

(16-01-2013 02:14pm)PhilSkill Wrote:  What do you mean by designed that way? Either an engine has enough torque on Idle to cruise continually or it needs the throttle pressed to use fuel to generate more torque to avoid stalling, the Evoque will activate the throttle idle to try and continue running rather than stall, within the limits of the engine and conditions, it will eventually stall if you demand too much torque from the engine at low rpm.

That is what I meant, it is designed to apply more gas so as not to stall. I agree that it can only do this within the power and torque outputs of the engine. Land rovers are well known for being able to pull up hills etc with no throttle applied, although gearing will have a lot to do with how capable they are. Defender in low ratio 2nd gear will pull up almost anything at tickover

Two reasons - the anti-stall device and the flywheel effect of modern diesels. Not only will they go uphill with no throttle in low ratio, but the massive engine braking effect in low 1st helps keep speed under control on downhills in a diesel powered Land Rover with a low ratio gearbox - it was one of the reasons that LR developed HDC for the Freelander1 - allowed the car to have a normal gearbox without the extra weight of a dual range system, but utilised the traction control and ABS to control speed.

Excellent...explains everything. Thank you!! Not noticed with any of my other diesels though.

My daughters Audi A3 diesel does it as did my A5 petrol