Supreme diesel makes HDI jerky

[Oliver53]

Last Saturday I went to a Esso garage to feed my 53 xsara picasso 2.0HDI. I just noticed it's supreme diesel after started filling...stopped but already got around 13L in. Then I drove off. I noticed the fuel gauge didn't go up, it looked like that I hadn't filled the tank at all. I thought the fuel level sensor might not like the supreme diesel but wasn't really worried about that. Then I drove for about 5 miles and parked somewhere for 3 hours.

While I was driving again I felt the tip out driveability was obviously poor -- in fact it's very jerky! But idling was OK. The fuel might be the cause of problems I thought, so I went to Tesco and filled the tank fully with normal diesel --that's around 35L. The first good news was that the fuel gauge came back:) And then I found the tip-out issue was gone, the engine became as smooth as usual

Have anyone experienced such problems with supreme diesel before? Maybe the strong detergent within the supreme diesel washes off some deposit inside the fuel system and led to inaccurate quantity of injection at low load? Or anyone got a theory?

[electronmirror]

Not sure what you mean by "tip out driveability" could you elaborate?

I've never noticed much difference when filling a near empty tank with any of the major brands (Shell, BP, Esso) of 'premium' diesel.

[Oliver53]

Not sure what you mean by "tip out driveability" could you elaborate?

I've never noticed much difference when filling a near empty tank with any of the major brands (Shell, BP, Esso) of 'premium' diesel.

Hi, tip out means the operation of quickly release accelarete pedal. In this case a car with good driveability should smoothly transition power output to avoid noticeable torque disturbance.

[SaabC5]

Not sure what you mean by "tip out driveability" could you elaborate?

I've never noticed much difference when filling a near empty tank with any of the major brands (Shell, BP, Esso) of 'premium' diesel.

Hi, tip out means the operation of quickly release accelarete pedal. In this case a car with good driveability should smoothly transition power output to avoid noticeable torque disturbance.

Nope, been driving 26 years and i'm lost.

Premium diesel shouldn't affect any aspect of the driving, if anything it should improve the drive due to the higher octane rating. The only time i've noticed any difference in driving due to the fuel is with a Saab 9-5 Aero which is spec'd to run on 97/98 RON premium fuel. It will run on 95 RON standard but the ecu pulls back the tune to compensate and you can feel a small loss of power as a result.

[Peter.N.]

I have been driving diesels since 1959 and I have never noticed any difference whatever fuel I have used.

Peter

[SaabC5]

I have been driving diesels since 1959 and I have never noticed any difference whatever fuel I have used.

Peter

Agree 100% with diesel. Any make, any octane rating, all the same to my HDi

[electronmirror]

One thing did occur to me regarding the explanation given by the OP. Some 15 years ago I seem to remember an annoying characteristic on petrol engined cars where taking your foot off the accelerator suddenly did not result in an immediate drop in engine revs. This could give rise to an abrupt change in torque delivery. The phrase "tip out driveability" I've never heard before, wonder if comes from across 'the pond'.

The reason given in some quarters was to do with reduction in NOX emissions resulting from rapid throttle closure.
I think a simple form of hydraulic damper was used to ensure a gradual closure, this was subsequently replaced by electronic means over the years.

BTW Octane rating refers to petrol but diesel fuels have a cetane rating.

[myglaren]

I've used all makes including supermarket diesel (and petrol when appropriate) including the premium option.
The only time I found any difference was with BP petrol in my Accord. The first time it was a little bit livelier but was quite lively to start with (fastest car I have owned) and economy improved a bit but the second lot was very poor and economy went right down - same service station in Guisborough, same pump, a week in between and no other petrol used in between.

The only other one was that, returning from Little Horwood I have twice filled up at an Esso station near Doncaster (White Rose) and on both occasions - three years apart and different C5s, economy nosedived in comparison to normal (which is crap anyway) performance remained the same.

I rotate randomly between Shell, Total, Torq (whatever the hell that may be) Sainsburys (closest) and once in a blue moon ASDA. The last one is usually poorest economy but not as bad as Esso.

Never BP as it is always much more expensive - the one time I did try it as it was supposedly cheapest I inadvertently filled with premium that nearly killed my wallet when I went to pay. Didn't seem any better than standard.

My dad was employed by a marine engineering firm that also owned an Esso station. He would never use Esso in his cars, reckoned it was rubbish despite getting a staff discount. Always claimed it was worse when the dredger was operating (Whitby harbour and the Esso station was at the harbourside).
No doubt apocryphal but he wasn't the only one.

[jgra1]

interesting Steve.. re dredging etc

'economy nosedived in comparison to normal (which is crap anyway)'

in a 110? manual ? what were you getting

J

[myglaren]

Yep, 110. Usually 32 mpg. Improves substantially on a long run, best yet was 669 miles on a tank (67L)
The estate was exactly the same (same engine)

The Accord was the same too - 2.0i LS. 32mpg no matter how driven or loaded, except with the BP premium where it dropped to 25mpg

[Oliver53]

Tip-out is a technical term used when assessing the driveability of cars, so is Tip-in which means pressing down accelerate pedal quickly. These two operations are to test the car's step input response characteristics. Sorry I'm not a native speaker I just assumed English-speaking people would know these terms.

I just recall that a few years ago I had the similar experience but with a petrol picasso. After refilling the tank in a strange garage I'd never used, the car became jerky and didn't want to respond to my input smoothly. Torque suddenly dropped to negative when I released the pedal, making the car behave like I depressed the brake pedal heavily. Many of my colleagues were engine management calibration engineers, they said it might be because of too much water in the fuel. Probably the petrol tank of that garage wasn't properly maintained and water in the fuel wasn't removed in time. Similar as this time, problem gone after the next filling.

[jgra1]

I expect 1000 miles on a tank, if all of that is on a run.. I must admit I don't know what a tank translates as, for day to day use.. but maybe not dissimilar to you
heavy car really, only economical when underway..

[Northern_Mike]

Yep, 110. Usually 32 mpg.

Seriously? Is it broken?

I've failed to get less than 45.6mpg out of mine over the last few months, and that's driving it like a tool. If I'm sensible it averages 53.3 on the computer display, which actually works out slightly pessimistic.

That's a mixture of town and B road driving, anywhere between standstill and 70mph using either Sainsbury or BP fuel. Sainsbury is next to the office, BP is near home.

It's a pity it swigs coolant, the radio is intermittent and it steams up otherwise I'd like it.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk

[myglaren]

Yep, 110. Usually 32 mpg.

Seriously? Is it broken?

I sometimes wonder but as said, the estate I had before it was the same.
It is in part due to very short trips for the most. It does about 15 miles ever 24 hours. My son takes it to work at 23:00, returns it to me at 07:10 when I take it to work, it stands there until 16:30 when I come home. Lots of hills, roundabouts and traffic lights and boots of Spanish Leather - no - Lead it was.

Today it has been to Brum (NEC) and it will be interesting to see what my son has wrung out of it. About 400 miles round trip.
My youngest daughter gets better economy than I do when she has it and she isn't known for hanging about.

[Peter.N.]

My 110hp Hdi C5 estate has averaged 57.7 mpg for the last 4000 miles, admitted we only generally use it for long runs and I do drive like a granddad. When we went to the north of Scotland this year it averaged 60.1mpg. I rarely drive at more than 60 mph or 2000 rpm.

If yours is running cold all the time and on short journeys I suppose 32 mpg is possible. My 406 Hdi drops to the 40s if only used locally but it did 67.8 over 650 miles coming back from Scotland last year.

Peter

Peter