Contaminated Petrol

[Guest john]

Did anyone see the news tonight about the contaminated petrol ?

 

My son had to get the AA to get him home last night, suffering exactly those symptoms in his golf gti.

 

We spent all day head scratching and came up with nothing wrong. If it is the fuel, I'd love to kick somebody's backside. Arrrhhhh !!!

[chris n]

Just found out about this

 

contaminated petrol

[Guest Dredd]

Just spent £700.00 on a £100.00 service for my wifes Merc SLK. The oxygen sensor had gone and required replacement. Guess where she fills up......... Tesco! Will be looking for compensation.

[Guest tom2b]

5% bio ethanol in tescos fuel, i had no idea!

[chris n]

Thinking about it, Becky (chris n's missus) had a burnt out spark plug which in turn damaged the coil pack on her astra the other week and ended up costing over £200 to repair. She had just filled up at tesco from empty did a 10 mile run with it and it just started to misfire like mad on the way back.

[Guest TerryBarry]

To quote from BBC News website

 

"Jonathan Church, Tesco's media director, said the company was testing fuel from a terminal in Essex.

 

"We've tested and re-tested including from some of the vehicles that have had reported problems and we actually can't find an issue.

 

"So at this stage we can't trace the problem back to Tesco fuel. That said, obviously we're continuing to work with our supplier to see if we can find a problem and if there is one we'll let customers know."

 

Morrisons also issued a statement following the complaints. The chain insisted it had found nothing wrong with fuel bought from its stores.

 

"Morrisons suppliers test every batch of unleaded petrol to ensure that it meets British and European standards.

 

"Having received a limited number of enquiries further tests were carried out. These found no contamination and confirmed our unleaded petrol met the required standards."

 

Well what else do you expect them to say

[Guest Daniel Aldridge]

Got new plugs, New fuel ,air and oil and filters today with the view to servicing the car tomorrow because its been running a bit uneven and hesatant. Then I saw the news!

Yep you guessed it I fill up at tesco too,

Danny

[Guest salty_monk]

Out here in California all the fuel has 10% ethanol these days. It oxygenates the fuel & leads to a cleaner burn apparently.....

 

Dan

[Guest timswait]

Out here in California all the fuel has 10% ethanol these days. It oxygenates the fuel & leads to a cleaner burn apparently.....

 

Dan smile.gif

Ethanol raises the octane number too, it's how they get their new super duper super up to 99 octane. It's not the ethanol which is the problem...

[Guest elwe]

I believe the problem is too much ethanol being added (~30% rather than 5%). Ethanol needs to be mixed with air at a much higher ratio than petrol and some cars will not have enough spare capacity in the injectors. Thus the injectors will go wide open, the engine will run lean/misfire and the plugs could melt due to detonation. Alternativly the ECU may notice something is wrong and assume that the oxygen sensor is sending it duff readings, after all it knows its putting in plenty of fuel. The ECU will then flag an oxygen sensor failure and go into limp home mode.

 

The good news is that if I am right the solution won't require a new oxygen sensor. A draindown and refill of the tank and a reset of the ECU faults will fix the problem. If the tank level is low enough you could dilute the excess ethanol with more petrol down to an acceptable level.

 

If there is too much ethanol in the fuel then the fuel would still pass many standard tests, bioethanol is in many respects a superior fuel.

 

If I am right then BMW and Vauxhall will be worst hit, they have least spare capacity in the injectors (except the VX redtop). Volvo, Peugeot/Citroen and (suprisingly) Rover will be best off as they have most spare capacity in the injectors.

 

If the oxygen sensors are being killed then its almost certainly silicon or lead in the petrol. Although you need to be careful about accusing the last garage you filled up at. Even running on fully leaded petrol it takes about 50 hours running to kill an oxygen sensor, which is several tanks worth, and the damage may not show up immediatly, though it won't take too long to show.

[Guest timswait]

The good news is that if I am right the solution won't require a new oxygen sensor.

That'll please all the people who have been charged for a new oxygen sensor!

Your explanation sounds pretty believable, seems to fit most of the symptons.

[Guest john]

There is a theory that this is not due to anything deliberately added to the fuel. Allegedly the tankers which bring fuel in, also carry some sort of chemicals from uk on their outward journey ( return load etc ).

It is being said that one of these did not flush out his tanks before loading the fuel.

Hence the problem should be traced to one tanker - full.

 

At my local filling station this morning, the manager told me it was focussed on the Milton Keynes depot, where some major supermarkets purchase from. ( not wishing to add names here ).

 

Hearsay, I know, but sounds plausible, [[ and i accept no liability for its acuracy !! ]]

 

Times like this i feel good about a basic old Volvo with a carb and No sensors !!!

[chris n]

I heard on the radio on the way home tonight that they had found traces of Silicon in the fuel.

We had two bi-fuel van in at work today running ok on LPG but not on petrol, plus one of the guys at work had his wife phone up to say that there BMW wouldn't go over 30mph and the engine management light was on and yes she had filled up at you know where

[Guest gdc]

the reason there not finding anything wrong when testing the fuel is that the large retailers are refilling their tanks every other day . so if this started a week ago the evedence is now in the tanks of the vechicles that are experiencing the problems and the garage tanks have been washed clean by several refills of good fuel.

[Guest TerryBarry]

On the BBC TV News tonight, a reporter stated that the problem was due to silicon in the fuel.

However it was pronounced "silicon" but the caption came up as "silicone".

Apparently silicone is used in petrol as an anti-foaming agent - or do they mean diesel ??

I am aware that certain silicone compounds are used as anti-foams in many industries.

However silicones do have a nasty effect on oxygen (lambda) sensors.

 

I suppose somebody will find an answer

 

I also suppose I'm fortunate to have an Esso station at the bottom of my road - but no Clubcard points then