Yes you are right.

ReggiePerrin wrote:

janderson wrote:

What’s the thoughts on letting me go below my normal fill up level and fill the tank with BP v power.

In our little town with its single two pump filling station, it is easier and perhaps 70p a tank more expensive to fill up there with 'Texaco' cheapest than to do the ten or twelve mile round trip to our nearest Tesco or Morrisons forecourts. (A bit of local business, use it or lose it going on there too).

That said, I'll happily fill up with standard grade from any of the supermarkets whenever it is expedient to do so. Supermarket branded fuel has never caused me any grief.

On that same theme, on the very odd occasion I've filled up with a premium grade, it has been mixed into whatever cheapo happens to be already in the tank and then, at the next fill, mixed again with whatever brand of cheapo standard is to hand.

Life is too short to be precious about the grade or brand of diesel we burn in our fairly agricultural transit engines so go to down to the West Midlands, enjoy your trip and worry not about the diesel - avoid motorway fuel if you can - supermarket fuel is fine.

Out in Kenya at the moment and hired a petrol Landcruiser. They guy told me that it has two 90 litre fuel tanks and only go to branded garages like Shell or Total etc as fuel quality varies. Luckily petrol is only about £1.15 per litre. (Diesel is slightly cheaper). I will need a mortgage to fill it up when we return it.  3 x FL1 2 manual + 1 auto
5 x FL2 4 manual + 1 auto
Now Discovery Sport P250 MHEV SE

I recently contacted BP Customer Services requesting evidence of the effectiveness of their Ultimate Diesel fuel and links to any published research.

They eventually replied
"Dear Customer,
Please accept our apology in the delay in our response. Your query has been passed to our fuel technical experts and you will receive a reply shortly.
Kind regards,
Retail Customer Care Team"


and subsequently
"Thank you for contacting us about bp Ultimate fuels with ACTIVE technology. We are always pleased to have the opportunity to provide further information to our customers who have more interest in the technical details.

At bp we make very substantial investments in state-of-the-art testing facilities, employ highly skilled people, and obtain external quality accreditation to make sure that our results are accurate. With more than 100 years in fuel research, our dedicated team of scientists and engineers deeply understand the interactions between fuels and vehicle technology as both continue to evolve. This allows us to develop and test fuels that complement and benefit both the latest vehicles and older vehicles. Our innovative fuels are specially adapted to each market and are typically in development for several years, having undergone many different test methods and rigorous testing for thousands of hours in engines and vehicles.
Our regular unleaded and diesel fuels contain a performance additive, but we design our premium fuels to have a higher performance than our regular fuels and, in the UK, have elected to reserve our most advanced engine cleaning performance for our Ultimate fuels.
Over time a build-up of dirt on critical engine components can make your car feel less responsive, run less smoothly, and use more fuel. It could even lead to parts needing repair. Even a small amount of dirt can have a big impact on the performance of an engine, so a clean engine is important to keeping a vehicle working as it should, and the fuel you chose plays a key role.
Our scientists have extensively researched the problem and that’s why they specially designed bp Ultimate fuels with ACTIVE technology to tackle the hidden problem of engine dirt. Over five years developing these fuels our scientists carried out rigorous testing, both in the lab and in real vehicles, going beyond industry standard tests to better represent real life driving conditions.

In diesel engines a build-up of dirt in the fuel injectors restricts the flow of fuel causing a reduction in maximum engine power. The loss in power may be felt by the driver as a loss of responsiveness; for example the vehicle doesn’t perform as expected when accelerating. The graph below shows how bp Ultimate Diesel with ACTIVE technology helps restore engine power by cleaning fuel injectors in a test engine. At the start of test the injectors are dirty and the engine has lost some 5% of its power as a result. You can see how the power is restored and maintained after running on bp Ultimate Diesel.

bp Ultimate Diesel with ACTIVE technology is designed to clean away the majority of dirt in direct injection diesel engines within one to two tankfuls, so any benefits should start to be noticeable after that.*
bp Ultimate fuels with ACTIVE technology can also give more miles per tank.** We determined the fuel economy benefit that could be achieved through the use of bp Ultimate as described below.
Fuel economy testing was conducted on a representative range of used passenger cars. These were selected to represent a variety of the types of engine technologies present in UK vehicles. The vehicles were tested using a drive cycle designed to better reflect real life driving than the current EU legislative drive cycles.
The fuel consumption of each vehicle was measured. The vehicles were then fuelled with bp Ultimate and driven. The fuel consumption of each vehicle was then measured again.
The fuel economy benefit was calculated from the fuel consumption measurements by multiplying the percentage fuel saving by a typical range per tank for UK passenger cars.
For diesel vehicles the fuel economy benefit is primarily derived from the removal of dirt from fuel injectors; bp Ultimate Diesel cleans away the majority of dirt in diesel engines in just one to two tankfuls.*
Actual fuel economy benefits achieved from using bp Ultimate may vary depending on vehicle type, condition, engine technology, driving style, road conditions and other factors such as length of journey, climate, tyre pressures and vehicle loading.
We like to think of our Ultimate fuels as an investment in the longer-term health of your car. They help engines run more smoothly and efficiently and help keep them performing at their best. bp Ultimate with ACTIVE technology can even help reduce the risk of unplanned maintenance with ongoing use.
We understand that some customers are not prepared to pay a premium for Ultimate fuels and that’s why we offer them a choice. Lots of our customers choose our Ultimate fuels once every few fills, and even a single tankful provides benefits. However, for the best results ongoing use is recommended.
*Benefits vary based on what and how you drive.
** For Ultimate Diesel based on engines tested in dirty vs cleaned condition. Benefits vary based on what and how you drive."

Unfortunately no graph was included in the reply.

So they have offered no published research - because either their research is non-existent (which I doubt), their research is poor and unpublishable (eg sample size too small), or their research shows no benefit or maybe a detrimental effect and so has been suppressed (common tactic).
They get around the trades description act by adding riders (see * and **) .

So it comes down to
"We sell an expensive fuel which we think may be of benefit in some way but we cannot offer any evidence to support that notion"
Their marketing department is certainly effective - maybe more so than their wonder fuel.

I have a deep loathing of pseudo /bad science to persuade the use of drugs and chemicals.

Needless to say I have requested more information from BP including their sample sizes and how many miles on average would a diesel engine need to cover in order to achieve a cost saving through improved MPG as a result of cleaner injectors.? Jules

Last edited by jules on 18th Mar 2023 1:13 pm. Edited 3 times in total

[quote="Past master"]I've found that there is a difference - but it seems to be a bit random

Which is probably what you would expect if there was no real benefit- some days you feel there is a benefit, other days not. Jules

If you average 36mpg on ordinary diesel fuel over 10,000 miles you would need to achieve nearly 40mpg over 10,000 miles to break even financially, given the cost of V-Power and Ultimate fuels.

Over 10000 miles the cost difference is around £160 so you could argue that adding a branded injector cleaner (eg Wynns) every now and then would be more cost effective. Jules

Last edited by jules on 18th Mar 2023 1:40 pm. Edited 1 time in total

While I’m never quite sure if BP Diesel Ultimate (we don’t have Shell fuels over here in Norn Iron) gives improved smoothness/performance/fuel economy in my FL2, there is no doubt that Ultimate petrol in my Volvo C70 T5, with a high pressure turbo, made a noticeable difference to smoothness and fuel economy. (It’s hard to say if performance was improved as the car was so blxxdy quick no matter what petrol you put in it!). But interestingly, with our Volvo V50 T5, with a slightly bigger engine and a low pressure turbo but much the same horsepower, it made absolutely no discernible difference and it only ever got regular supermarket fuel.

I suspect that the benefits, such as they are, of premium fuels could be achieved by adding one of the many diesel fuel additives to a tankful of ordinary fuel. My daughter is having to use my FL2 as her Jeep is giving trouble so she is going to add some Millers Oils diesel additive to the cheap - £1.50 a litre - diesel she has been using in her Jeep. (Maybe that’s why it is giving trouble )

Yes the petrol super fuels will boost performance and mpg as they have a higher octane rating and produce more power in a petrol engines.

With diesels its a bit different - my understanding is that the base super fuel itself offer no performance gain so additives are added to improve the cetane rating. Whether it makes a noticeable difference to seems to vary from driver to driver - ranging from a definite no to a definite yes. Jules

I noticed a 10% improvement in mpg after swapping out the O2 and Exhaust Gas Temperature sensors, especially on a long run. Also there is an improvement think it's around 5% for a few weeks after putting a full bottle of Red Ex in a quarter tank of fuel

Last edited by I Like Chips on 18th Mar 2023 8:33 pm. Edited 1 time in total

Fortunately i live close to costco and use their premium diesel which is £1.55 per litre.
Car runs well on this

jules wrote:

If you average 36mpg on ordinary diesel fuel over 10,000 miles you would need to achieve nearly 40mpg over 10,000 miles to break even financially, given the cost of V-Power and Ultimate fuels.

Over 10000 miles the cost difference is around £160 so you could argue that adding a branded injector cleaner (eg Wynns) every now and then would be more cost effective.