Does anyone use Premium Diesel in the car?
Discussion
Since fuel prices have dropped so low, and I've started doing high mileage I've decided to put some BP Ultimate in, only 2 tanks in but I honestly don't believe you'd notice the difference after one tank, and I can't say I've noticed a real difference either. Maybe it idles slightly smoother or smokes less as I have noticed the smokescreen ability lessened, but overall nothing much.
Tempted to try the snake oil in the tank and see what happens.
Tempted to try the snake oil in the tank and see what happens.
I used to run Premium diesel (either Shell or BP) in my old Golf TDIs as I was able to achieve another 30-40 miles out of each tank, thus mitigating the increased cost. If it was doing my engine more good, then I was happy with the few pence difference in my monthly fuel bill.
MPG gains aside, the engine was a lot smoother on the pricier fuel. No discernible power difference, though.
MPG gains aside, the engine was a lot smoother on the pricier fuel. No discernible power difference, though.
mph1977 said:
ah the joys of placebo effect and confirmation bias ... the broscience is strong in this thread but that;s what the branded fuel retailers want you to think ..
Thought it wouldn't be long before the nae-sayer's turned up. I tested both premium and non premium fuels back to back on my regular commute and found the premium fuel to be slightly more efficient. Driving conditions on each tank were as near to identical as possible.Pennyroyal Tea said:
mph1977 said:
ah the joys of placebo effect and confirmation bias ... the broscience is strong in this thread but that;s what the branded fuel retailers want you to think ..
Thought it wouldn't be long before the nae-sayer's turned up. I tested both premium and non premium fuels back to back on my regular commute and found the premium fuel to be slightly more efficient. Driving conditions on each tank were as near to identical as possible.how much more 'efficient' ? again statistically significance ?
doesn't remove the placebo effect either ...
I'm sure placebo comes into it somewhere as I don't really buy into people running their cars on chip fat for a decade then being able to tell the difference within 10 miles of throwing in some V Power.
That said, I looked (a lot) and struggled to find anything definitive on what goes into V Power and in what quantities, in the end I settled on Shell not throwing a few billion quid into their Pearl GTL plant for the sake of it and also figured that I'm losing a few grand a year in depreciation on my car, I probably shouldn't be losing too much energy over £10/month extra on good fuel.
That said, I looked (a lot) and struggled to find anything definitive on what goes into V Power and in what quantities, in the end I settled on Shell not throwing a few billion quid into their Pearl GTL plant for the sake of it and also figured that I'm losing a few grand a year in depreciation on my car, I probably shouldn't be losing too much energy over £10/month extra on good fuel.
mph1977 said:
over tens if not hundreds of tankfuls ? i.e. was the sample size sufficiently large to be significant
how much more 'efficient' ? again statistically significance ?
doesn't remove the placebo effect either ...
I said it above; 30-40 miles more out of a tank, turn about each week for 6 months. Each time I filled with the good stuff, I'd get slightly more out of a tank. Given that my TDI 130 was solely used for the commute, I was able to achieve pretty even consistency.how much more 'efficient' ? again statistically significance ?
doesn't remove the placebo effect either ...
There's no placebo to it.
Of course, the premium fuel was more expensive, so the net savings were minimal, but, as I also said above, if I was doing my engine a favour (and it certainly felt smoother), then that's a win-win. Cold starts especially were less smelly with the expensive stuff.
Extra economy is an added bonus but my Cosworth runs much better on premium fuel, in fact it will not run full boost on the cheap stuff. My daily driver 6cyl petrol BMW also runs better on them. As I said previously, the TD bus runs much better too. This is from many years of using the stuff.
Interestingly, SWMBO says that she cannot tell the difference either.
Fortunately I shall not take offence at the suggestion that I am stupid enough to buy things purely because of the advertising.
Interestingly, SWMBO says that she cannot tell the difference either.
Fortunately I shall not take offence at the suggestion that I am stupid enough to buy things purely because of the advertising.
V8A*ndy said:
Here in Northern Ireland up to a short while ago, all fuel came from the same depot in Belfast to all outlets.
I suppose they add in additives but the fuel was the same from the very start.
Also for petrol, the highest ron you can get is 97 if you can find it. I'd be all over that Tesco 99 stuff if I could get the chance.
We're in Northern Ireland too, and same problem. We use a Millers Octane Booster to take the 97 RON up to 98/99 RON in our 370ZI suppose they add in additives but the fuel was the same from the very start.
Also for petrol, the highest ron you can get is 97 if you can find it. I'd be all over that Tesco 99 stuff if I could get the chance.
I'd a Golf 1.6TDI diesel that i did 25,000-30,000 miles a year in.
I measure fuel economy brim to brim for the 18 months i had it, and averaged between 65-71mpg on each fill through careful, steady driving and long commutes.
I used a variety of fuels, most of them budget / supermarket brands and the occasional premium brand. The premium brands gave no better fuel economy than the budget brands and in fact the best economy i recorded over a tank of fuel was slightly over 71mpg and that was on a supermarket brand.
I did 33,000 on the car in total before i sold it, and no mechanical issues whatsover.
I'm now running older diesels (jag was 10 year old, insignia is 6 years old) so i use a Millers Diesel Fuel additive which is supposed to help clean the inside of the engine. It works out at about 1p per litre, as opposed to a premium diesel which could be up to 10p more - for presumably little else other than additives in there.
I measure fuel economy brim to brim for the 18 months i had it, and averaged between 65-71mpg on each fill through careful, steady driving and long commutes.
I used a variety of fuels, most of them budget / supermarket brands and the occasional premium brand. The premium brands gave no better fuel economy than the budget brands and in fact the best economy i recorded over a tank of fuel was slightly over 71mpg and that was on a supermarket brand.
I did 33,000 on the car in total before i sold it, and no mechanical issues whatsover.
I'm now running older diesels (jag was 10 year old, insignia is 6 years old) so i use a Millers Diesel Fuel additive which is supposed to help clean the inside of the engine. It works out at about 1p per litre, as opposed to a premium diesel which could be up to 10p more - for presumably little else other than additives in there.
I always used 99 Ron with my patrols but for diesels it's an utter waste of time & money.
The engine cannot extract more energy out of a Ltr of special diesel over normal diesel as they don't add anything to it to increase that aspect.
It needs independent testing to verify any real benefit.
Also one thing to consider is fuel goes off. Normal diesel will not as its being used all the time from the fuel stations premium derv could be there a long time as such it goes off and is indifferent to usual derv. You'd not know if it's fresh or not until you buy.
As for noise buy a V8 or I6 diesel not an I4 that's terrible noise
The engine cannot extract more energy out of a Ltr of special diesel over normal diesel as they don't add anything to it to increase that aspect.
It needs independent testing to verify any real benefit.
Also one thing to consider is fuel goes off. Normal diesel will not as its being used all the time from the fuel stations premium derv could be there a long time as such it goes off and is indifferent to usual derv. You'd not know if it's fresh or not until you buy.
As for noise buy a V8 or I6 diesel not an I4 that's terrible noise
Welshbeef said:
I always used 99 Ron with my patrols but for diesels it's an utter waste of time & money.
The engine cannot extract more energy out of a Ltr of special diesel over normal diesel as they don't add anything to it to increase that aspect.
It needs independent testing to verify any real benefit.
Also one thing to consider is fuel goes off. Normal diesel will not as its being used all the time from the fuel stations premium derv could be there a long time as such it goes off and is indifferent to usual derv. You'd not know if it's fresh or not until you buy.
As for noise buy a V8 or I6 diesel not an I4 that's terrible noise
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetane_numberThe engine cannot extract more energy out of a Ltr of special diesel over normal diesel as they don't add anything to it to increase that aspect.
It needs independent testing to verify any real benefit.
Also one thing to consider is fuel goes off. Normal diesel will not as its being used all the time from the fuel stations premium derv could be there a long time as such it goes off and is indifferent to usual derv. You'd not know if it's fresh or not until you buy.
As for noise buy a V8 or I6 diesel not an I4 that's terrible noise
Welshbeef has an interrsting beef re going off I never realised that will not stop me using shell nitro though http://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp-country/en_au/med...
I keep a spreadsheet of car-related expenditure so a few years ago I tried V-Power diesel in my E46 320d to see what would happen. Subjectively, it did seem to make it run a bit smoother and rev a bit more easily; spreadsheet-wise, efficiency seemed to be a bit better, at least round town - motorway journeys were unaffected - though not enough to make up for the direct cost.
I vaguely recall calculating that it was basically even, compared to ordinary fuel, once my Shell points were taken into account.
By contrast, I never noticed a difference in my E46 330d, which seems not really to care about fuel type - if there's a difference between one and the next, be it Morrison's or Shell V-Power, it's indistinguishable from noise. So I now just fill it up at Tesco. It's cheap, and I get Clubcard points.
I vaguely recall calculating that it was basically even, compared to ordinary fuel, once my Shell points were taken into account.
By contrast, I never noticed a difference in my E46 330d, which seems not really to care about fuel type - if there's a difference between one and the next, be it Morrison's or Shell V-Power, it's indistinguishable from noise. So I now just fill it up at Tesco. It's cheap, and I get Clubcard points.
I don't have a BMW but I've used premium derv (V-Power) in my Scirocco constantly. I prefer the added additives which help keep things less gunked up. When I've changed my fuel filter at 20k or so it's still quite clean and there's no build up of dirt, my car is on stock HPFP and injectors and nearly at 160k now and I suspect that I may have had some injector issues using normal diesel.
For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
xjay1337 said:
I don't have a BMW but I've used premium derv (V-Power) in my Scirocco constantly. I prefer the added additives which help keep things less gunked up. When I've changed my fuel filter at 20k or so it's still quite clean and there's no build up of dirt, my car is on stock HPFP and injectors and nearly at 160k now and I suspect that I may have had some injector issues using normal diesel.
For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
This ^ For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
I dont run an oil burner any more but what with variable vane turbo's etc I believe the better detergents keep things cleaner, I tell my customers to throw in a tankful at least once a month I have also had motors throwing over boost fault codes (sticking turbo vanes) recovered by doing this on various VAG models and my nieces RAV4 thats been fault code free for over 2 years following my advice 
it was going into limp every other day due to the sticking vane syndrome previously 
(bloody dangerous on the motorway) and yes I'm on the tools so this is straight from the horses mouth 
for the costs involved its a no brainer prevention is better than cure and lets face it modern diesel faults are seldom cheap to rectify 
Edited by Sardonicus on Monday 15th February 11:18
xjay1337 said:
I don't have a BMW but I've used premium derv (V-Power) in my Scirocco constantly. I prefer the added additives which help keep things less gunked up. When I've changed my fuel filter at 20k or so it's still quite clean and there's no build up of dirt, my car is on stock HPFP and injectors and nearly at 160k now and I suspect that I may have had some injector issues using normal diesel.
For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
My missus has a VW with the latest EU6 engine and the emissions stuff is terrifying - dual EGRs etc etc. I wouldn't dare use anything else but V-Power in that. It's irritatingly more expensive locally though - 11p/litre dearer today so around £5.50 for today's refill.For me it makes no real cost difference, I can easily offset the £2.50 or so per tank by driving carefully.
Sheepshanks said:
My missus has a VW with the latest EU6 engine and the emissions stuff is terrifying - dual EGRs etc etc. I wouldn't dare use anything else but V-Power in that. It's irritatingly more expensive locally though - 11p/litre dearer today so around £5.50 for today's refill.
Those marketeers have you hooked . Or are you suggesting that the diesel on sale normal is not suitable?
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