Shell VPower unleaded - any noticeable difference ?

OMcGovern

I normally just use the standard 95 octane unleaded petrol.
I don't drive anything special... a 1996 Mazda 323F 1.5 L.

I saw the adverts in the shell garage about the Shell VPower unleaded brand,
that it cleans the engine as you use it.

Anyone tried it, or noticed any difference ?

regards,
Owen

colm_mcm

As far as I can see, a few years ago, Shell tried to sell premium priced "Pura" petrol, thing is nobody wants to pay extra to save the environment. It disappears off the pumps and is replaced by another petrol that cleans your engine, this time they market it as a sporty fuel. I think it's a load of arse,
If you need to clean your engine out, buy a bottle of STP injector cleaner.

crosstownk

It may have some benefits but getting you car serviced regularly usually keeps the engine clean enough. If it was necessary to use petrol additives then the manufacturers would recommend it. Just make sure the petrol you purchase has the correct RON and all will be well.

BrianD3

I agree with colm, I would be dubious about the benefits of this fuel and I believe the "sporty" name given to it is just cynical marketing by Shell.

Don't waste your money on it.

endplate

The Ferrari formula 1 team is supplied fuel from Shell. One of the rules of F1 is that the fuel the cars use must be the same as what's available in a petrol forecourt. The Vpower from Shell is a form of this petrol hence the reason it's there. 98octane is the only fuel recommended for high preformance cars too. There is no point putting it in an ordinary car as you won't get any noticable preformance difference just a bigger hole in your wallet.

Henry Ford III

This is a con job.

Shell 95 u/l and Shell V-Power have the exact same octane rating of 95 RON.

Shell Optimax is available in the UK only, and has a 98 RON rating.

OMcGovern

colm_mcm wrote:

If you need to clean your engine out, buy a bottle of STP injector cleaner.

Cheers Colm,

I looked up STP products, and didn't realise such things were available.
I don't do any car maintanence myself, but do get the car serviced regularly.
I always thought that a mechanic would have to flush the engine with cleaning solvents after by removing the fuel and bleeding the system dry... didn't think there'ld be a handy bottle you could throw in yourself.

Thanks for the tip... will definitely check that out.

regards,
Owen

smarty

Just back from a track day at the Anglesey Circuit in Wales. Everyone at the track day who was driving high performance cars swore by Optimax. At lunch time, they all drove in convoy to the shell garage, which was about 5 minutes past a non-shell garage to fill up on optimax.

I had never used optimax before, but tried it for the track day and there was a noticable improvement.

If you put optimax into a fiesta or a golf, you probably wouldn't notice any difference because these type of cars are designed to run on 95 octane fuel, but many turbo charged and high performance cars are designed to run on 98octane fuel. When you use normal 95 octane fuel in these cars, the performance is curtailed.

Surprisingly, the Optimax only costs about 5p more per litre than ordinary fuel. From what I remember, V-Power (Pura) also costs about 4 or 5 cent more. I haven't purchased super plus in any texacos for a couple of months, but last time I did, I think it cost 20 cent more than 95 octane fuel.

colm_mcm

I think they jack the price of the 98 up because they sell so little of it, and usually there's no local competitor so anyone who needs to use 98 has no choice

MrPudding

Top gear or fith gear did a test. They had a normal car, something a bit sportier and an Imprezza. They put normal petrolin them and ran them on a rolling road to measure the HP. ONce completed they drained the fuel system and reset the engine management and put in the 98 stuff.

There was no difference in the normal road car, a small difference in the sportier car and something like an extra 30HP in the imprezza.

MrP

Big Balls

Just for all of you making points on 98 RON, V Power is not 98.

I used it for the first time this week and the car runs slightly smoother and seems to use slightly less fuel.

It's a MKV GTI which needs 98 RON to run properly but it's not available in this country anymore so I feel that putting something in that has some additives in it over 'normal' unleaded can't be a bad thing.

colm_mcm

you can get 98 in some Texacos AFAIK

zuutroy

I get better fuel economy (easily enough to cover the price difference), slightly improved performance, and a smoother drive from V-Power. My car is a 15 year old Jap import. My mate tried it a few times on his 02 Camry and noticed little difference