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Shell Super unleaded


hank

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Quite by chance, I filled up with Shell Super and found that there was no running on when the ignition was turned off, as experienced with other makes.

Car is Vit 2 - no mods.

Has anybody had similar experience?.

 

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if you find it better on shell super   what were you using before ????

any 97+ will be fine in our machines ,  95  was for  low compression side valves and mowers  the higher the octane  the  better 

its been discussed to death many times , our cars were designed to run on 101 

Pete

 

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14 hours ago, Pete Lewis said:

if you find it better on shell super   what were you using before ????

any 97+ will be fine in our machines ,  95  was for  low compression side valves and mowers  the higher the octane  the  better 

its been discussed to death many times , our cars were designed to run on 101 

Pete

 

Very True. There is a limit you can retard the ignition. 98 yes with a loss of performance. 95 no, as this results in running on plus other problems. 

Anybody remember the fitting of two head gaskets to low the compression to run on low octane fuel.

Sorry to be heavy on the point.

Dave

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no double gaskets on my side valve Minx I cut a load off the head to raise the comp.    and fitted long reach plugs on a spacer to protrude into the chamber  rather than shrouded,   every little helps   ha !    

it had a talbot race head and twin  2ft long 1.3/4 " tail pipes exiting from one of those peco exhaust boosters   remember them ???

Pete

 

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30 minutes ago, Pete Lewis said:

twin  2ft long 1.3/4 " tail pipes exiting from one of those peco exhaust boosters   remember them ???

Pete

 

They used to be everywhere! Noisy, too, although on Minis it was a choice between the bigbore Peco and the cherrybomb exhausts, which ended up being banned...

I have a period SNIP tailpipe which I might fit to my 1200, but it's supposed to help performance rather than just make noise...

 

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Thanks to OPs for replies.

I can remember filling up with 101 octane as I bought my Vit  in 1974 -this weekend celebrates 45 years behind the wheel 

More recently, I have been using BP Super , Sainsbury Super ( said to be supplied by BP ) and Tesco Momentum ( claimed 98 octane) .

As I mentioned, I filled up with Shell Super by chance and found that it improved the  running on issue. Then next  time I reverted to BP Super and the problem returned so I have filled up with Shell Super  again.

There seems to be a lot of mystery about petrol  - who supplies what petrol and extent of ethanol dilution .The recent Courier article recommended Esso  Super but this seems to be unobtainable around here ( Derbyshire ).

I'm going to start using Millers VSPe to  increase the octane rating.

 

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Don't forget that Shell V-Power you buy in one part of the country may be totally different to other parts of the country, all depends on which refinery it came out of.

And it is definitely different to the same product on mainland Europe.

A web search will tell you which refinery serves your part of the country. All suppliers get their fuel from Shell Haven or.Coryton in the Southeast, then add their own additives.

Tesco Momentum is 99 round here and comes from Greenergy. it gets its octane from bio ethanol I think

Best I have ever found is Aral 101 in Germany. Proper rocket fuel. Car just sounded different. Tweaked the timing to suit in both a TR4 and a PI saloon.,

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13 hours ago, hank said:

Thanks to OPs for replies.

I can remember filling up with 101 octane as I bought my Vit  in 1974 -this weekend celebrates 45 years behind the wheel 

More recently, I have been using BP Super , Sainsbury Super ( said to be supplied by BP ) and Tesco Momentum ( claimed 98 octane) .

As I mentioned, I filled up with Shell Super by chance and found that it improved the  running on issue. Then next  time I reverted to BP Super and the problem returned so I have filled up with Shell Super  again.

There seems to be a lot of mystery about petrol  - who supplies what petrol and extent of ethanol dilution .The recent Courier article recommended Esso  Super but this seems to be unobtainable around here ( Derbyshire ).

I'm going to start using Millers VSPe to  increase the octane rating.

 

+1 for VSPe which I found reduced run on and pinking although now that I have the engine running cooler both have improved a lot just on standard 95 and I save the additive for longer, higher speed runs.

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  • 10 months later...
On 01/06/2019 at 20:41, thescrapman said:

Don't forget that Shell V-Power you buy in one part of the country may be totally different to other parts of the country, all depends on which refinery it came out of.

And it is definitely different to the same product on mainland Europe.

A web search will tell you which refinery serves your part of the country. All suppliers get their fuel from Shell Haven or.Coryton in the Southeast, then add their own additives.

Tesco Momentum is 99 round here and comes from Greenergy. it gets its octane from bio ethanol I think

Best I have ever found is Aral 101 in Germany. Proper rocket fuel. Car just sounded different. Tweaked the timing to suit in both a TR4 and a PI saloon.,

Both of those refineries closed years ago. Shell Haven in 1999 and Coryton in 2012

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i have been using sainsbury 97+ in the rorty vitesse6 from 2002 to 2015   and in the 2000 from then till now and never had any hint of poor running 

I have never used 95  (2** mower fuel when these were made )  or had any unleaded supposed conversion  or ever wasted money on any addative apart from a bottle won in a raffle both have run like clockwork on it , no misfires, no sooty, no pinking 

if the fuel plays such a big part in how the car behaves  me thinks  theres another underlying setting thats not 'optimum

just some thoughts 

Pete

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Different? Refineries? How?

A 'rocket fuel' is only a rocket fuel if the engine can use a higher CR or is timing adjusted to take advantage of a higher octane rating.     Moderns do the last automatically, so a fill-up with a 'better' fuel may provide improived performance, but in our engines?       The "Octane Number" does not describe the power availble from a fuel, only its 'knock resistance".     It compares the fuel with a mixture of octane, which is knock resistant, and heptane, which is not!     An octane number of "98%" means that the fuel has the same resistance as 98% octane in heptane.

The number isn't consistent!  There's the Research Octane Number (RON) and Motor Octane Number (MON)!   These refer to slightly different test protocols, the US using MON, which is 8-12 below RON.    Then, the Anti-Knock Index (AKI). that is the mean of the two!    

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1 hour ago, Pete Lewis said:

I have never used 95  (2** mower fuel when these were made )  or had any unleaded supposed conversion  or ever wasted money on any addative

I remember in the 1980s filling my car with three star and closer to payday, 2 star... :)

We have a lot of dodgy fuel over here, agricultural stuff filtered through cat litter and the like and smuggled up through the border lands, so you need to use a trusted garage and stick to it. Even the large supermarket chains aren't immune - there was a bad batch came through one of them a while back and people's engines were giving up.

As for additives, one of my Heralds came with a huge box of over 100 one-shot tubes of Castrol octane booster, so when that's gone, they'll get nowt.

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12 minutes ago, Colin Lindsay said:

I remember in the 1980s filling my car with three star and closer to payday, 2 star...

I never did that intentionally but I did once select 2-star accidentally. I realised half way through filling and finished off with 4-star. A fellow customer, when I confessed what I'd done, said "you'll be fine, they were a low compression engine on those Heralds". I had to point out that mine was actually a Mk1 Vitesse with the 100 octane spec. engine.

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Hello,

I have always gone for the highest octane fuel available for my classics which in the main is either Tesco Momentum 99 or a couple of minutes up the road for Esso 97 Synergy; both have provided excellent running service for the unleaded Vitesse.

I did have a Sunbeam Alpine (unleaded head) which I tried on 95 and it did not like it one little bit.

Oddly enough the Daimler (head suitable for unleaded fuel) can run without issue on 95 so I have been informed and the WSM says fine with 94. However, I have never bothered to test these statements and I use either 97 or 99. I believe it's a case that once you have tried a certain fuel spec / brand and your car runs well on it that becomes your benchmark. I appreciate that CR has a significant role to play in the above statements, but I am looking at the situation in broader terms.

When I took the Vitesse to France, a few years back, I used Millers VSPe just to counter any possible running issues with ethanol; but all was well and of course 98RON was available which was handy.

With fuel prices now at a considerable low, compared to years gone by, it's an ideal time to fill the fuel tanks.

Regards.

Richard.

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