Premium petrol

[Wallace]

Has anyone tried premium petrol in their IS300h?  I've seen Honest John in the Telegraph twice say something like " why pay £40,000 for your car and put the cheapest petrol in the tank?".

[ianhu]

And what's the definition of cheap petrol. It doesn't exist in the UK at least. Its all expensive.

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[NemesisUK]

I've never used anything but V-Power in my RC300h. The difference in the cost of a tank isn't significant in the scheme of things..

[matt8]

Used to use premium (Shell V-Power) and eventually stopped. Now use Costco Kirkland standard petrol (which I hear is a very good quality fuel)

Premium fuel typically costs 10% extra. Are you happy with that?

 

[NemesisUK]

Yes.

[Pink]

I only ever put premium fuel (BP Ultimate) in my previous car but not so sure about the 300h. I can never see myself using supermarket fuel but think I’ll stick to decent branded regular petrol like BP or Shell rather than the premium Ultimate or VPower. I’ve only recently owned the car, and have only tried 2 tanks of both regular and premium since then. Can’t say I noticed any difference in either mpg or smoothness, but that’s far too short a period to tell. When I asked the dealer about premium fuel when I picked up the car, he noted that the Atkinson cycle on these petrol units is clearly aimed more for efficiency rather than power, so the additional Octane of premium fuel was unlikely to be as beneficial as opposed to a traditional Otto cycle ICE. 

[rayaans]

Doesnt make any perceptible difference in the 300h 

[Rabbers]

Whether the prices asked for Premium over Regular are justified in terms of measurable benefits have occasionally been discussed on LOC Forums

without much consensus of opinion.  As regards my own view, I remember being taken to task for suggesting that putting Premium in your car is a

bit like expecting premium-priced pet foods to deliver wetter noses and glossier fur when you may really be letting  the natural desire to 

pamper the object of your affection get the better of you.   Not that there is anything wrong with this, far from it, but, much as I have tried over the

years to put a positive spin on the possible advantages in terms of mileage or power and performance of using Premium, I have objectively found

none or very few - and although the advertised claims of some brands may well be accurate, they presumably derive from testing in controlled

conditions that have little to do with real life.

The 10% premium typically asked over Regular in the UK mentioned by Matt is well above the norm of most other European countries, where I would

guess the average to be more like +5-6%.  Be this as it may, even if, as Peter would reasonably maintain, you end up laying out the same cash for ten

tankfuls as you otherwise would for eleven, few of us will notice the difference within the economics of owning and running our types of car.  Really,

the only thing that irks me somewhat about the price of Premium is the oil companies' reluctance to narrow the gap between it and Regular, which

they could probably do without reducing their margins too much if one is to judge by their expenditures on Premium-specific advertising, forecourt

displays, and promotions such as double loyalty-points etc.  

My own practice, based less on conviction than force of habit, is to fill up with Premium only occasionally, say every 6-7 re-fuellings, thus supposedly

and desirably "flushing out" the fuel system (and keeping in mind the unpleasant and probably not wholly accurate comparison with clogged arteries

resulting from an unhealthy diet), even though I'm aware that the same result could be achieved with judicious squirts of injector-cleaning fluid.  I

should add, however, that I recently heard that flushing-out by either of these methods could, if you're unlucky, have the dire effect of not removing                                          

 deposits and encrustations but of merely shifting them to other possibly more critical locations.

 

[reeac]

I don't think that the dog food comparison is a valid one. There are some very poor quality cheap dog foods made using very dubious ingredients. They are favoured by owners of habitually greedy dogs like labradors. Even if you buy expensive food you can get caught out as I did when our dog developed pancreatitis due to his dried food, which was prepared from human consumption grade chicken, virgin olive oil  and rice, turned out to have too high a fat content. Given the magnitude of veterinary bills it's wise to check these things quite apart from the dog's welfare.

Petrol, on the other hand, all has to meet quite narrow specifications and although I believe that some supermarket own brands barely meet additive specs., 95 octane of a big name brand ( I always favour Shell) will be fine for an IS300h which isn't that highly tuned at 72 bhp/ litre. I owned a much loved Jaguar XJ8 for 16 years and always used 95 with never a hint of trouble from the engine.

[Wallace]

Thanks for all the replies, I think I will continue putting the odd tank of Shell in to dilute the Tesco or Asda fuel.

[Rabbers]

19 hours ago, reeac said:

I don't think that the dog food comparison is a valid one.....

I was trying to make a point about possible lapses of objectivity that tempt one to pay premium prices (as I myself often do) without benefits

that are guaranteed or immediately obvious or demonstrable.   At the risk of labouring the point, I would say that purveyors of branded fuels 

and pet foods both characteristically target, perhaps not always scrupulously (although my own usual tendency is to initially give them the

benefit of the doubt), customers who are open to exploitation because of a possible no-expense-spared attitude towards items of property - 

cars and pets respectively - that not only inspire fondness but are also often realistically capable of repaying it when treated well.  It could

 be argued, however, that many of these would more than adequately repay such fondness even when treated less well and less expensively.  

My analogy between oil companies and pet food manufacturers and their respective products and customers/end-users extends no further  

than this. 

[LexusIS300h]

I have only had 4 fill ups from owning my car and the first one was premium fuel by accident. It recorded the worst fuel consumption of the 4 fill ups, brim to brim, so I wasn’t too happy with that.

I don’t think I drove any differently and I know the tank was full when I bought it, so maybe I was unlucky but I think I will stick to standard no frills petrol

[Guest]

I reckon some people care more what they put in their car than their body.

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[BigChange]

For what it's worth have just returned from many miles in France and used E10/95 petrol throughout (on one occasion there was no choice).  Mostly motorway but did not notice any difference in performance or mpg.  But I did notice the difference in price !

[DanD]

I recall reading somewhere that if you are to use premium petrol, you have to use it all the time to note any kind of significant difference, and that using is every so many tank fulls is pointless... a bit like wanting to lose weight, but only dieting on Tuesdays!

Don't know whether or not there is any truth in this: over my years of car ownership, covering 20k-30k per year, I have only ever used standard supermarket petrol in all my cars and neither them nor I seem to have fared badly for doing so.

[Anatoliy]

On 10/22/2018 at 5:51 PM, Wallace said:

Has anyone tried premium petrol in their IS300h?  I've seen Honest John in the Telegraph twice say something like " why pay £40,000 for your car and put the cheapest petrol in the tank?".

Hi,

Yes, I do sometimes, Shell V-Power for my old GS450h and current IS 300H F sport. It does improve MPG (just a little bit) and gives slightly quicker response when accelerating. 

[DanD]

Is this something you have actually measured... or the old placebo effect?

[Vlady]

18 hours ago, Anatoliy said:

Hi,

Yes, I do sometimes, Shell V-Power for my old GS450h and current IS 300H F sport. It does improve MPG (just a little bit) and gives slightly quicker response when accelerating. 

I noticed that using Shell V-Power is increasing an MPG (not much) and also I it feels like my engine runs quitter and smoother but I only fill the tank with expensive stuff once every 2-3 months and the rest of the time I use standard shell petrol, it cheaper! 🙂 But always Shell though not supermarket.

[wharfhouse]

I have three local petrol stations - Shell, BP and Sainsburys and use them all from time to time (only 95 RON standard fuel). The order I rate them in terms of smoothness/quietness and mpg are:

1. BP

2. Sainsburys

3. Shell

As Sainsburys is usually a few pence cheaper than the other two that get's used the most so long as I am heading in that direction when I need to fill up. I find very little difference between BP and Sainsburys but don't find the car runs as smoothly on Shell.

[darrude]

On 11/2/2018 at 5:17 PM, wharfhouse said:

I have three local petrol stations - Shell, BP and Sainsburys and use them all from time to time (only 95 RON standard fuel). The order I rate them in terms of smoothness/quietness and mpg are:

1. BP

2. Sainsburys

3. Shell

As Sainsburys is usually a few pence cheaper than the other two that get's used the most so long as I am heading in that direction when I need to fill up. I find very little difference between BP and Sainsburys but don't find the car runs as smoothly on Shell.

Get someone else to fill your car and not to you where they went and see if you can still notice the difference.....

My mate loves vodka, got to be grey goose. Did a blind taste test with him, not only failed to tell which was grey goose but said he preferred the cheap stuff I brought back from morroco (in fact we all did).  He is still convinced grey goose is superior though.

 

My point is, there is a lot of money to be made in subjectivity....

Ps interesting story, if you Google Sidney Frank, re grey goose and jagermeister.

 

[wharfhouse]

I agree there is a lot of subjectivity in this but I actually wanted Shell to be better than Sainsbury's to justify it's higher price and the feeling I am using "better petrol" but every time I use Shell it just feels worse and when I put Sainsbury's in then the car goes back to what I expect. I don't know maybe I do need to try a blind test but I've chopped around a lot between the three and keep coming to the same conclusion. 

[Guest]

It's easier to fool someone than to convince them they have been fooled.