Car suddenly intolerant of E10 petrol
Discussion
I've got a bit of a strange issue. My 2002 Volvo S60 2.0t seems to have suddenly become intolerant of E10 petrol. I've run the car exclusively on Sainsbury's unleaded since buying it last year, from the same filling station each time. It's been perfectly OK until a couple of weeks ago, when I began noticing hesitation which then led to a full blown misfire, constantly running on 4 cylinders rather than 5. The cylinder that is affected is cylinder 5.
I didn't think of fuel to begin with, because only one cylinder is affected (according the the EML fault code). Tried the usual things like swapping the plug and coil onto cyl 4, but the misfire stayed with cyl 5.
Had it into the garage, but as Sod's Law dictates, the car behaved perfectly for them, so no fault found. Just to rule out compression, I did a test on all 5 cylinders with came back with a consistent 200psi across the engine - no problem there.
As a bit of a last resort I stuck a tank of Esso E5 premium fuel in. The car felt totally different - no further issues over two tanks. I'm assuming I still have an issue brewing (injector?) but the E10 fuel is exacerbating it?
Has anyone else encountered this?
I didn't think of fuel to begin with, because only one cylinder is affected (according the the EML fault code). Tried the usual things like swapping the plug and coil onto cyl 4, but the misfire stayed with cyl 5.
Had it into the garage, but as Sod's Law dictates, the car behaved perfectly for them, so no fault found. Just to rule out compression, I did a test on all 5 cylinders with came back with a consistent 200psi across the engine - no problem there.
As a bit of a last resort I stuck a tank of Esso E5 premium fuel in. The car felt totally different - no further issues over two tanks. I'm assuming I still have an issue brewing (injector?) but the E10 fuel is exacerbating it?
Has anyone else encountered this?
CoolHands said:
I think you’ve leapt to the very unlikely conclusion it is the e10. More likely a different problem eg the injector as you say.
I think it's definitely something to do with the fuel - but perhaps exacerbating a brewing issue.I've been a month chasing this issue, and suddenly a tank of premium fuel and it hasn't acted up in hundreds of miles.
Depending where you are in the country Esso Synergy Supreme is slightly unique among "premium" fuels in that it doesn't have any ethanol in it.
I don't know enough about car engines to know whether that could have anything to do with it but it's the one thing that leaps out about the "instant" change in behaviour as definitely being different.
I don't know enough about car engines to know whether that could have anything to do with it but it's the one thing that leaps out about the "instant" change in behaviour as definitely being different.
SebastienClement said:
I've got a bit of a strange issue. My 2002 Volvo S60 2.0t seems to have suddenly become intolerant of E10 petrol. I've run the car exclusively on Sainsbury's unleaded since buying it last year, from the same filling station each time. It's been perfectly OK until a couple of weeks ago, when I began noticing hesitation which then led to a full blown misfire, constantly running on 4 cylinders rather than 5. The cylinder that is affected is cylinder 5.
I didn't think of fuel to begin with, because only one cylinder is affected (according the the EML fault code). Tried the usual things like swapping the plug and coil onto cyl 4, but the misfire stayed with cyl 5.
Had it into the garage, but as Sod's Law dictates, the car behaved perfectly for them, so no fault found. Just to rule out compression, I did a test on all 5 cylinders with came back with a consistent 200psi across the engine - no problem there.
As a bit of a last resort I stuck a tank of Esso E5 premium fuel in. The car felt totally different - no further issues over two tanks. I'm assuming I still have an issue brewing (injector?) but the E10 fuel is exacerbating it?
Has anyone else encountered this?
Its a bit of a leap to think its E10 thats the problem, if that was the problem then it would most likely have run badly whenever used, its more likely a fault with the car, E10 isnt the devil people make it out to be, yes it can eat fuel lines, but most modern hoses can cope with it/are designed for it, as are most ecu able to adapt. It may have been a bad tank of fuel, but very unlikely unless you use a very out of the way petrol station, most fuel isnt there long. I didn't think of fuel to begin with, because only one cylinder is affected (according the the EML fault code). Tried the usual things like swapping the plug and coil onto cyl 4, but the misfire stayed with cyl 5.
Had it into the garage, but as Sod's Law dictates, the car behaved perfectly for them, so no fault found. Just to rule out compression, I did a test on all 5 cylinders with came back with a consistent 200psi across the engine - no problem there.
As a bit of a last resort I stuck a tank of Esso E5 premium fuel in. The car felt totally different - no further issues over two tanks. I'm assuming I still have an issue brewing (injector?) but the E10 fuel is exacerbating it?
Has anyone else encountered this?
It is possable that you have a injector that is going bad, and E10 shows this more, but thats where i would be looking, otherwise, why is it on only one cylinder. I remember back in the day when we were alowd naughty fuels in racing, we used to get through injectors alot, but im talking many years ago.
So while it may not have helped, i would be supprised if the fuel is the main cause.
Having the injectors tested is a fairly cheap thing to have done. And that would be my first call, If it was a collapsed fuel line or something, it would affect all cylinders.
Ethanol needs a slightly different air fuel mass ratio to burn efficiently. It's possible that the affected cylinder is already slightly out of optimum and this small change is enough to cause running problems. A healthy engine would usually compensate for this change based on EGO feedback, but if it's only affecting one cylinder then the ECU will have to compromise.
ETA the fact the symptoms hid when faced with the expert suggests the problem may be sensitive to the environment or the way it is driven, and not a simple component failure.
ETA the fact the symptoms hid when faced with the expert suggests the problem may be sensitive to the environment or the way it is driven, and not a simple component failure.
Edited by GreenV8S on Monday 3rd April 13:19
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