V-Power Vs Standard

[Taylor911]

Hi All,

Since I got my 675 i've been putting shell V-power in it.
Are there actually any benefits of doing this or am i simply wasting my money?

I've heard it burns cleaner so it produces more power and is better for the engine etc..

But what are the actual benefits?

Andy ::)

[Mitch9128]

Less water in the fuel for sure, my old 9r used to carb ice with normal unleaded, but not with V power?!

[Scotty]

There is no water in petrol, carb-icing is due to atmospheric moisture condensing and freezing. Quite why your bike doesn't suffer icing when using a different fuel I can't explain, but it isn't due to water in the fuel.

As for V-Power or other super unleaded fuels, I've never bothered with them personally, even for the track bike, but I'd be interested to read anyone's objective appraisal of a true comparison to see whether the additional cost is worth it.

[Dabz]

I'd always read that uk vehicles are tuned for our standard 97(?) RON fuel so the 98/99 stuff isn't worth it unless you have something like a jap import. I suspect you'd be better saving the money and treating the bike to a service instead

[Swanny]

Yea like Dabz says if your bike isn't tuned to run on higher octane then you're just giving more money to the rip of oil companies

[A13X4ND7A]

not sure if its any different on bikes but I used to run my V6 Golf on it and I never noticed any difference, although I'm sure I heard the same as Dabz that the vehicle needs to be tuned for a higher octane.

[jonnydangerous]

fuel (apart from the 100 or so other additives) is made up of :-
a certain percentage of easily combustible material that "starts the fire" and a certain amount of fuel that "sustains the fire" (normally represented as a percentage of N heptane and Iso-octane for testing purposes).
the "super plus/Vpower" is actually LESS easily combustible but MORE sustaining, meaning that you have to "squash" it more to get the benefits from it (you make it more volatile by increasing its temperature by squashing it more).
your bike has a compression level set to utilise normal unleaded, and will NOT benefit (in most cases) from superplus/Vpower....

there are exceptions, for instance, the short stroke/large bores of 1000cc v twins (honda SP1 for example) can benefit from a longer burning fuel, as it then burns completely right to the bore edges (which is a VERY long flame path compaired to a 600cc 4 cylinder!!!....(same revs = same time for both engines to burn the mixture).

you generally wont see any difference on the road tho, youll just be wasting your money, unless you have an engine with an increased compression ratio or excessive boost pressure in turbo engines.

[Taylor911]

Right. Thanks chaps.

I won't bother with the extra cost from now on then!

Ta :)

[voodoo]

you generally wont see any difference on the road tho, youll just be wasting your money, unless you have an engine with an increased compression ratio or excessive boost pressure in turbo engines.
[smiley=thumbsup.gif] only ever used it in high power/boost turbo'd cars which were made for the jap market 100+ RON fuel. it's pretty much pointless buying it for 99.9% of the UK vehicle market

[voodoo]

oh and even then you have to get it mapped for the different fuel to get any benefit

[Rabb]

I have tried high octane fuels in performane cars and big 4X4's (V8's)
- doesn't make a blind bit of difference to performance or mpg.
Save your money - I wasted a bit of money by buying this stuff for about a month and reverted to normal 97 RON.

[Yammy]

Shell V-Power is good for keeping the inside of the engine clean from carbon deposits that over time build up and can cause a drop in power.

it's the same for other premium fuels like BP's Ultimate.

They don't give you any more performance but they help keep your machine healthy. There's a video for Shell V Power's cleaning attributes on Youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU35MkEThG0

[Senna(Dan)]

I have found that shell fuel is the best to use in the bikes. Get an extra 40 miles from the XJ6 just from changing from the supermarket stuff.
The supermarkets fuel has more ethanol in it and this can cause some bikes to run sloppy, it is also alot cheaper to prduce.
I know the Senna isn't happy unless it is running the better fuels, I have tried this at several garages to make sure it wasn't the dregs of the tank when filling up. It means a more expensive bill but there is definetley a difference in performance.
I think fifth gear did a feature a few years back, proving that unless you have a £180k+ supercar you wont really notice the difference. I'd imagine the same applies with more powerful bikes.

[Jon_W]

Most machines are tuned for 95RON or below. The additional octane will not boost power but may increase fuel economy ( I did a trial in my old mini a few years back and got a slight increase in economy - not a lot though).

The only advantage to the super unleaded fuels is that currently many do not contain ethanol. All premium fuels (including shell I'm afraid) are currently E5 (EU bull meaning we have 5% ethanol in the fuel). This will go up to 10% soon.... so be aware, many older bike and cars will suffer. Older bikes will run a bit better on super because they were set up for leaded and/or E0 fuel. The big difference is that the fuel will withstand a higher pressure before self detonating, hence the use in high boost turbo cars.