Premium Fuel, Millers, The World and everything....

S3 AKR

livin' the dream!!!
Jun 30, 2004
1,453
1
Colchester, Essex
Ok.... a lot has been said recently in the press and on telly about the effectivenes of premium fuels, fuel additives and both their claims to increase power, reduce smoke and improve MPG. Well, with all the time I have to kill on my silly huge commute each day I have been testing the claims of Millers, and Shell V-Power over a tank of std diesel and how it feels on the road. There is no measures other than mileage covered and how I perceive the car to feel. I cover a lot of miles each week and spend far more hours than is healthy in my car so I know my car and the way it runs pretty well! Its not science, more just about what the ordinary bloke in the street would notice day to day if he were to run it through his 40k mile Leon FR TDi with Revo switched on!

At the moment the Leon is on tank 2 of Shell V-Power and Millers (double dose in this tank) as I'm experimenting with what does and doesn't seem to work in my car. I do 160 miles a day, about 120 of which is motorway/dual carriageway between (near enough) Clacton and Canary Wharf and the rest being on A-roads (from Braintree to Colchester and on the A13/A406 in London). Its a very consistent journey in both directions with only about a 5 min variation in journey times between days so I reckon a fairly good test.

Standard Diesel - Car runs fine but feels like a diesel at low revs, less so when cruising at motorway speeds. A tank of fuel stretches to about 620 miles with the computer shouting that I have about 20 miles left to run. A tank costs about £45 prior to Gordon Brown fleecing the motorist further via more tax rises this past week. Pretty smokey under acceleration.
Shell V-Power on its own - definitely smoother, quieter, a little more go, a little less smoke and about 10miles a tank further.
Shell V-Power with single dose Millers - marginally smoother. That's about it. No noticeable difference in smoke, MPG or power
Shell V-Power with double dose Millers - a little smoother and quiter once again. More refined running and a little more responsive. Still as smokey as without the Millers and MPG about the same as V-Power on its own!

Conclusion with Shell V-Power - Millers isn't worth the extra cash in my view and its claims of 17.5% more bhp must be in some very exceptional circumstances which I'd love to know more about. The majority of the extra MPG, Power and smoke reduction is a result of the Shell V-Power more than the Millers. Its a shame as I really wanted the Millers to be the wonderstuff that people seem to be reporting. Maybe its not so noticeable in V-Power type fuels.

For completeness I need to try Millers in with std diesel which I'll do next once its had a tank of std passed through without Millers. I'll be filling up again on Tuesday evening so I reckon I'm about 2 weeks away from finishing that little test!

On costs - V-Power is about £5 more over 620 miles than std diesel. Millers would be about £1.20 more if single dosing over the same mileage.



My wife is not sure which is saddest - doing the tests at all or writing them up on here! They just don't understand:whistle:
 

alx_chung

Dark Lord of the Torque
Sep 11, 2006
1,540
0
In front of a PC....
Interesting post. Food for thought, I have been debating whether to fill up with the expensive stuff or not as well as getting some Millers in the tank. This might sound like a noob question but do you just put the Millers into the tank as if you were filling up the car? And also how much do you put in per tank?
Thanks,
Alex
 

BJM

Active Member
Sep 25, 2005
739
6
Houston, Renfrewshire
Millers has a measure on the top of it, usually 2 measures per tank for single dosage! I used the Millers sport 4 for around 5000 miles however when I ran out and wasnt using it, I never notice and difference in Performance or Economy.

I dont bother with it anymore.
 

S3 AKR

livin' the dream!!!
Jun 30, 2004
1,453
1
Colchester, Essex
Interesting post. Food for thought, I have been debating whether to fill up with the expensive stuff or not as well as getting some Millers in the tank. This might sound like a noob question but do you just put the Millers into the tank as if you were filling up the car? And also how much do you put in per tank?
Thanks,
Alex

Its a very small amount that goes in with every 20 litres of fuel. You put the dosage in, then the fuel. The bottle is designed so that you cn only put in 1 measure at a time via a little chamber in the neck of the bottle. Its a 500ml bottle at 10 tanks worth of treatment so each measure must be 25ml.
 

daveyonthemove

Smile if you like SEAT's
May 14, 2006
1,519
0
Wrexham
Well, after reading all that my only bit of advice would be to ignore it (no offence).
I found that premuim fuel made my car run crap, and on Millers DS4 and Shell extra i was getting aprox 20 miles extra per 1/4 tank (80 miles per tankfull) so my results are the complete opposite.
Find a fuel that
A) you can afford,
and B) The car runs well on.
Try Additives if you feel they are worth it (in my opinion they are) and give them a fair run over a couple of tanks full.
 

FabiaTDi

VT5 :D
Mar 22, 2003
152
0
Visit site
I don't bother with Millers anymore after experimenting with it on and off for probably around 8 years or so and over 3 cars. I think any effects are just "placebo"

I stick with regular diesel, but avoid supermarket fuel. My usual TCS regular diesel station (good prices) runs fine and their premium diesel I use now and again, but even that I am coming to the conclusion that it doesn't make any worthwhile difference.

Best to stop wasting the money and put it towards the next engine upgrade. ;)
 

muddyboots

Still hanging around
Oct 16, 2002
5,739
1
The trouble with trying to do comparisons like this, is the number of variables that change from one tank to the next, meaning you're never really testing like for like.

The two main being temperature/weather, and driving style.
Also, your ECU will need time to adapt to using different fuels & additives, so you won't get the full effect straight away.

For a true comparison, fuels need to be tested under controlled conditions...
 
Feb 1, 2007
1,602
1
Nottingham
I had got it into my head that millers does make a difference as I double dose. However after using for about a month and 3000 miles I have a serious suspect injector problem. :cry:Millers at fault? Who knows
Glynn
 

OLDOILER

Full Member
Jul 28, 2005
1,292
1
Wiltshire, UK
Well, after reading all that my only bit of advice would be to ignore it (no offence).
I found that premuim fuel made my car run crap, and on Millers DS4 and Shell extra i was getting aprox 20 miles extra per 1/4 tank (80 miles per tankfull) so my results are the complete opposite.
Find a fuel that
A) you can afford,
and B) The car runs well on.
Try Additives if you feel they are worth it (in my opinion they are) and give them a fair run over a couple of tanks full.

I agree tried Shell V power on my Leon 2 FR and the car derated its self [due to high internal temps] on the way down to Cornwall reverted back to std derv plus double dose millers 4 and have not had a problem since. [told super chips about this and it was a first that they had heard of]
 

InfernalBadger

Full Member
Sep 6, 2006
563
0
Berkshire
Mine was smoking quite a bit on Shell Standard (no extra or v-power round here). Swapped to BP Ultimate for the last 2 tanks and it's a lot less smoky, no noticeable difference in power or economy though.
 

MattFrench

No poke without smoke
Jan 16, 2007
112
0
www.rsfrench.com
I use Milleres pro sport 4 and will continue using it. It last for ages and i do notice a difference more so on shell etra and esso fuel. Millers stopped quite a bit of smoking for me. However i notice far more difference going to a premium fuel like v-power and ultimate. Ultimate is the best for my car, or what i believe, But 5p more!!!

Every body to there own, Mine is V-power/ultimate with millers.

Must add that mine smokes rather alot being tunned, i think its slightly over fuelling.
 

S3 AKR

livin' the dream!!!
Jun 30, 2004
1,453
1
Colchester, Essex
I'm not saying that you guys should or shouldn't use it and I'm not knocking those that do. I'm just reporting how I've found it to be in my car. I really want it to work for me as its cheaper than using V-Power especially given that I do 800 miles a week commuting!!

I still have to test it with a tank of standard diesel. I'm halfway through the untreated tank now so that I can get used to the car again without any additives before I fill up again on Friday and add the Millers Diesel Sport 4 in a single dose and then the next tank on a double dose.

Maybe using it in std diesel is its true forte and best use. My conclusion so far is that it doesn't do anything much in V-Power fuel - a test that I've only done to get a more complete view of the product in use from the same owner on the same journey in the same car with a fairly constant driving style.
 

skullmunki

Ding Ding Round 2!!!
Nov 12, 2006
502
0
.
wouldn't putting millers into v-power be defeating the object of using v-power in the first place? or at worst putting your engine at risk (of something, i dont know what though!), by adding additives to fuel thats already full of additives?

Anyway! I always tend to stick to shell extra with a splash of millers now and again (used to use it every tank, now its probably every other, and am aware (i think) that extra does contain additives too), i've never used supermarket fuel and never intend to. Its probably just a psychological thing, but I just think v-power is too expensive.

Thanks to S3 AKR for his tests though, found it quite informative. I suppose if your doing that kind of mileage week-in week-out, finding out which combo works best for you could save you quite a few quid!
 
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