Popped into local Shell station today to fill up herself’s car since it was at supermarket prices, was going to go back and fill mine later with the good stuff until I noticed it was a 23p premium per litre, not bother, Tesco here we come, feckin rip off.
E5 fuel premium.
- Thread starter martin j.
- Start date
Oh dear, the great debate concerning premium fuels. Dare I comment? Of course I will. I think there are two very good reasons why you might want to buy premium fuel, no, maybe 3?
So lets get the "maybe 3" out of the way first. It is to avoid the reported damage an E10 (or greater) fuel might do to your small engined machine. (lawn mower, cultivator, etc. Part of my hobby activities includes messing about with vintage horticultural machinery. Many of them use diaphragms in their carbs and fuel hoses which can be damaged by ethanol. They seem to survive the 5% but instructions have been issued by manufacturers not to run them on E10 for that reason so I run mine on E5. If you have a newer machine you don't need to worry, it'll be fine.
Second is that if you have an engine management system, as many modern cars do, which can take advantage of the higher octane rated premium fuel, then you will likely see a small improvement in performance - acceleration and economy. It's probably not going to be earth shattering and may not be enough to offset the extra cost of using the fuel - depends on the car.
Thirdly I think there is a very good argument to be made for using it in anything with one of these small direct injection petrol engines where I think the added RON will reduce the tendency to LSPI (Google it if you don't know what it is. Makes a very interesting read). Here's something to start you off : https://www.oronite.com/about/news-activities/low-speed-pre-ignition.html
So lets get the "maybe 3" out of the way first. It is to avoid the reported damage an E10 (or greater) fuel might do to your small engined machine. (lawn mower, cultivator, etc. Part of my hobby activities includes messing about with vintage horticultural machinery. Many of them use diaphragms in their carbs and fuel hoses which can be damaged by ethanol. They seem to survive the 5% but instructions have been issued by manufacturers not to run them on E10 for that reason so I run mine on E5. If you have a newer machine you don't need to worry, it'll be fine.
Second is that if you have an engine management system, as many modern cars do, which can take advantage of the higher octane rated premium fuel, then you will likely see a small improvement in performance - acceleration and economy. It's probably not going to be earth shattering and may not be enough to offset the extra cost of using the fuel - depends on the car.
Thirdly I think there is a very good argument to be made for using it in anything with one of these small direct injection petrol engines where I think the added RON will reduce the tendency to LSPI (Google it if you don't know what it is. Makes a very interesting read). Here's something to start you off : https://www.oronite.com/about/news-activities/low-speed-pre-ignition.html
I didn’t suggest that I wouldn’t use E5 fuel, but if Tesco etc can sell it at 7or 8p more why does this station think they should charge so much more, wasn’t always that big a difference between the fuels pre Russian invasion, so why now?
Is it so much better? I don’t think so.
Is it so much better? I don’t think so.
I used to always use Tesco Momentum 99 until the price hit £2+ a litre a few months ago. Since then I’ve been using the bog standard Tesco E10 unleaded and in all honesty, I can’t say I‘ve noticed any difference - performance or economy wise.
I might treat my car to the occasional tankful of the more expensive stuff, otherwise I’ll continue to use E10 which the car was designed to run on.
Really just because it's convenient I fill our cars at Morrisons with standard E10 and they run just fine on it. Ibiza 1 litre CHZB engine (turbo direct injection) and Fiat Panda 1.2. The Panda has the "old" F.I.R.E. engine which isn't at all fussy what I feed it on. The Ibiza might benefit from a higher octane fuel but it runs just fine on the standard offering returning around 40 mpg in general driving and a very steady 60 mpg on longer motorway trips. That'll do me fine. Although I am not really a believer in additives, especially for engine oil or transmissions - I prefer to just spend the money on a really high quality oil to the manufacturer's spec. However I do run this stuff in it's fuel: https://www.powerenhancer.co.uk/archoil-ar6900-p-max-advanced-petrol-synthesis.html been using it since the car was new in the hope that some of the Polyetheramine (PEA) will be able to delay carbon build up on the inlet valves on this direct injection engine. Only time will tell but she's over 6 years old now and still running very well. It may be that it's not addressing this aspect at all but maybe the included lubricants are doing the HP fuel pump and injectors some good and it includes an injector and system cleaner too so, who knows? At worst I'm wasting a bob or two at every fill up!
Similar threads
