Is there a difference in fuels? 29 November 2005 at 9:48PM edited 30 November -1 at 1:00AM in Motoring 6 replies 1.1K views

IvanOpinion

Long discussion at the weekend with a friend about whether or not thee is a difference between the fuels sold by the suprmarkets and those at (e.g.) a BP station. I would have thought not that much but my friend was adamant that his car runs quieter, smoother and gets better mpg using the BP diesel than the stuff from Tescos - he even reckons he gets a bit of additional power.

Has anybody any thoughts on this? It is about 5% dearer locally but maybe it is worth it?

ivan

Yoshii

yes there is a difference with shell optimax , bp ultima and supermarket fuel.fifth gear did a test filling up the same car with the 3 aforementioned fuels . cannot remember if the optimax or bp is more miles to the gallon ,but in lowdown torque and pulling power ,the shell optimax was the best in all categories.

and it is not the most expensive.

ps if you go on https://www.fivetv.co.uk/fifthgear

they may still have info on the web site
yoshii

shellsuit

To keep costs down supermarkets don't add as many additives to their fuels and pass the savings on to us. This is usually why their fuel is cheaper than the bigger forecourts.

However, the additives put in by BP. Shell e.t.c. are put in for a reason. Some help the fuel burn quicker therefore reducing engine wear and secondly help keep fuel injectors and other engine components clean with the detergents contained in them.

I'm not saying that supermarkets don't use additives it's just that they are not as strong as the mainstream fuel suppliers or have certain things left out which aid the cleaning of engines parts e.t.c.

I find that Sainbury's super unleaded is quite good. It's under 90p a litre by me and gives me slightly more power due to the higher octane compared with normal unleaded. I do every so often fill up with either BP Ultimate or Shell Optimax to flush the engine so to speak or i use Reddex 1 shot treatment to clean the fuel system out and that only costs 99p from Halfords.

tomstickland

About 10 years ago I ran a 1984 Escort 1.1 and that was very sensitive to fuel type. Big name stuff like BP/Shell/Esso ran noticably better than supermarket fuel.
A little later, when I had a 1989 Astra I used to need to put one tank in 4 of super unleaded in to prevent pinking problems. That suggests to me that about 1 tank in 4 of good petrol is enough and the other 3 times you can put cheap crap in. That's what I do nowadays anyway. Random mix is the king.

retailwarrior

Yeah yeah yeah

What I suspect most of you dont know is that 5% of all fuels in the uk are vegetable based, and have been for the past 20years!

I put in SVO in my clio (straight veg oil). I buy a few bottles every time I shop at tescos (cheapest rapeseed oil available) and pour it in round the corner before topping up with about 5lts of deisel.

Massive savings.

Are there any more of us out there?

retailwarrior

Yeah yeah yeah

What I suspect most of you dont know is that 5% of all fuels in the uk are vegetable based, and have been for the past 20years!

I put in SVO in my clio (straight veg oil). I buy a few bottles every time I shop at tescos (cheapest rapeseed oil available) and pour it in round the corner before topping up with about 5lts of deisel.

Massive savings.

Are there any more of us out there

retailwarrior

oops managed to do that twice!