Are they all what there cracked up to be?

BP Ultimate, Shell V power, dont know of any others, think theres total excellium or something?

Ive just bought my first turbo car (leon cupra) and its been remapped, allegedally though i cant find the printout in the mound of history ive got with it, it saw another 180 cupra left behind earlier so im believing it is..

Either way the guy i bought it off told me he always ran it on V power, or Ultimate by BP, the question here is, is this necessary, always?

Now im not thinking of, or talking about putting supermarket unleaded in it, but wouldnt any regular unleaded from a proper garage, such as shell, BP, Esso, Total etc be feasable? Im not bothered i have to pay £1.50 a litre for the ultimate etc, its got a tank of ultimate in it at the moment.. just trying to work out if im doing the right thing or should i just use decent unleaded aslong as its not supermarket stuff?

As you can see im not too clued up, petrol is petrol to me, diesel is diesel ! All i know, or more so led to be believed is supermarket fuel is crap!?

 

shell v power is the best in tests.

but super unleaded will only show more power if the cars mapped to it eg: ignition advance

or has a knock sensor

 

my cossie runs a bit better on v power but to be honest i run it on cheap supermarket crap as round here its about 30p cheaper a litre than v power lol its runs fine on it too just like i say runs a little better on v power

 

The bloke told me if i put normal unleaded in it, it doesnt run right, to him it appeared to be hesistant and hold back?

I think from what ive got here, its been mapped to 210bhp, from 180bhp. still got the standard exhaust, airbox and re-circ valve on though.

Might try putting normal unleaded in it next then, is it a myth that supermarket fuel is crap? according to google and a few searches supermarket fuel is just as good as normal fuel from bp, esso, shell etc..

Hmm.

 

I always run mine on v power. For an extra few pennys everytime you fill up is it worth the risk of damaging your engine.

 

my old vrs used to like tesco 99 the air boxes on them are ok tbh mate would not change it unless you want some more noise and get a 007 re circ d/v on there dude

 

Absolutely.
They're just a higher RON rating. The higher the rating, the better quality of fuel, apart from the obvious performane gains, it can massively reduce any detonation in an engine.
It makes me laugh when people use the standard shit in modified cars, it's just asking for trouble!
There's plenty of cars out the factory that recommend high octane fuels, the don't recommend it for the good of their health

 

Morrison's is just down the road from me and I find their petrol awful, if I am low on petrol I would rather put a couple of quid in of theirs and go the 5 miles down the road to the Shell garage. I don't use the V power but their normal stuff which is the same price as Morrison's and I notice a big difference compared to Morrison's, more miles out of Shell as well.

 

On your Cupra, it will certainly go better on super unleaded due to the adaptive knock control it has. It will run on normal unleaded but how well depends on the how the remap was done. If done properly, it shouldn't hold back. If it is holding back, the ECU is reducing the load/boost due to continuous knock.

Rick

 

I (for the most of the time) run on either Shell v or Tesco 99 although i do have to make a 10 mile drive to get the either. If i let it get a little low then i will only ever put a tenner worth of "Council Petrol"

Ian

 

If the car is mapped for super unleaded thats what you should be putting in it, otherwise you risk killing your engine.

Thats why a lot of imported scoobs and the like end up fucked, people use our standard unleaded when it is miles off what the use in japan

 

wonder what this runs better on
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=8433549

 

I thought tescos was the only 99ron fuel out there?
I have a shell at the end of my road, a tescos 1 min further and a bp at the other end, i tend to use whichever 1 is on my way.
Only ever use super in my good cars and normal in my birds golf.

The super diesel does seem to make my van and truck a bit quicker too but hardly ever use it.

 

Yeah I'm pretty sure Tesco has the highest octane rating.

 

the dirrence between cheap and super is like night and day in my gt4! doesnt run right at all on the cheap stuff holds back and idles rougher!

 

I dont think its all about the RON rating. I know the higher thr RON means the less likely it is to self detinate, but its more about the quality of the fuel. The higher the quality, the more of the fuel burns. So tesco 99 might not be as good as BP-97 as its doesnt burn as much of the fuel that goes in.

Some race fuels might only have a 96 RON but it burns more efficiently, that's why its so expencive.

I always use V Power as that was what the car was mapped on and it seems to be the one that tops the tests too.

I did hear that Shell are the only one that make their own fuel, and most of the other garages are the same from the same supplier?? I could be wrong.

 

That really wouldn't surprise me at all!

 

The ron figure had a close correlation to calorific value which is the energy output from combustion,
95 Ron Std
97 ron (95 + @ 4% toluene )
99 Ron Tesco uk/maxol Ireland 95 Ron + 5% ethanol

All fuels need @ 5% ethanol by 2013 I believe under eu directive

 

General rule of the thumb is FI engines respond well to SUL, but as said i the cars mapped for it it won't run right on lesser fuel, i.e. 95 RON.

For example I believe on a M3 your only supposed to use SUL.

Martin

 

modified turbo = vpower

 

My A4 drives like crap on 95. My stupid ex always used to put it in as it was cheaper then piss and moan it didn't drive right

 

Just about sums it up

If you design an engine to work it's best with the best fuel it will do so
And especially after a remap to get the most out of it, normal everyday engines are designed to have to make do with shit fuel and not run crap because that's what they've spent their money designing until you come aliń and want to increase the power

Think of it like an m5, in normal mode it's only making 400 brake, and then you twiddle some knobs to make it 500 brake, and it's the same thing

 

So its okay aslong as i put Vpower/ultimate and the rest of the named higher branded fuels, aswell as super unleaded, aslong as its not supermarket fuel, and not normal unleaded, ill be ok ?

Im going to get booked in and dyno'd in a couple of weeks once ive got my exhaust and that on, see how shes running, im unsure as of what to do with the air filter, i dont want a cone, i like standard look, i was contemplating fitting a K&N panel filter and drilling holes in the bottom tray of the airbox to let it breathe more freely, whilst retaining standard look at the same time, but drilling the bottom tray tends to raise a few eyebrows, i cant personally see a problem as the air is still getting filtered and it never harmed a couple of other cars i had.

 

My e92 says use only SUP..
Wouldnt ever run it on something less then 97ron. Theres a 4p diffrence between the cheaper stuff and the v power so a whole 2.40 more to fill up with V

 

Regular unleaded by me is around 1.32 a litre, super is around 1.37 thats at asda/tesco/sainsburys, V power/ultimate is around 1.45 - 1.50

Funnier still, it cost me £74 to fill the cupra with BP Ultimate.

It costs me £60 on average to fill a runabout 1.8 litre dog of a Focus

The Focus, though well maintained and serviced despite its condition it will do 250 miles on that £60 of supermarket unleaded before its sucking on the base of the tank.

The cupra, has so far done 260 miles and there is still 1/4 of a tank left, of mixed roads and ive kicked the backside out of it a good few times aswell. Averaging 30mpg.

 

There's nothing wrong with the supermarket equivalents, just don't use the watered down piss. Tescos is pretty good to be fair.