Experiences with V-Power 100 Octane in Aygo?

[Chris Boddum]

Hey people!

What are your experiences with V-Power 100 octane? I've been shifting between both 95 and 100 octane, and the car honestly seems to run better on 95 octane. Is it pre-mapped to run on 95 or something? I have a mk2 2015. Would like to hear your experiences.

Thank you!

[flash22]

Its such a small engine and only 3 cylinders (each cylinder is the size of a tin of Coke/Pepsi), it doesn't really need the higher octane, but it never hurts to put some decent fuel in the car once in while, in the uk that would be 98 or premium

now performance and turbocharged cars do benefit from the higher octane

[steveo3002]

id stick with the cheapest fuel...its a cheap n chearfull car made for cheap motoring costs , why spend more on fuel ?

could run the odd tankfull for the cleaning additives if it makes you feel better 

[Chris Boddum]

Yeah, it makes sense. Is it purely placebo when I feel that the engine runs better on 95 octane? Everything in the books really tells that it should run better on 100 octane, but it just doesn't feel that way - feels better with 95.

[S_J_P]

Back when I used to fastidiously track my fuel consumption, I tried alternating between standard and high octane fuel in my Aygo and saw no discernible difference in fuel consumption, neither did I feel any difference in the car. I guess the small difference in octane rating is insignificant compared to the changes in ambient conditions such as temperature, moisture, and density.

[Catlover]

I really cannot see the benefit of using 98 octane when 95 is recommended. All I would be doing is empty my wallet that bit quicker.

I do however put an additive into my petrol tank, Archoil 6200-EU. 250ml treats up to 2,500 litres, so very economic (5ml treats 50 litres of fuel if used regularly.

[FROSTYBALLS]

Toyota don't recommend 95 octane - in the owners manual they state 'use 95 octane or higher', as with most of their cars.

[Guest]

That most owners, myself included, can detect no performance benefit indicates that the engine management tuning cannot take advantage of the higher octane by increasing the ignition timing advance - so to me it seems the only possible benefit is the (claimed) better detergent and additive content of the higher octane fuels such as V-Power or Momentum. But as @Catlover says there are other ways to get that which cost less.

[Catlover]

15 minutes ago, FROSTYBALLS said:

Toyota don't recommend 95 octane - in the owners manual they state 'use 95 octane or higher', as with most of their cars.

That’s recommending 95 in my eyes, if not available, higher will cause no problems. 
It’s like the engine oil, 0w-20, but if not available 5w-something is ok.

[FROSTYBALLS]

No - it is stating the minimum requirement.

[TonyHSD]

Yes it states 95 as minimum however there is no benefit from using higher octane, additives are way better choice. Quality of the fuel, purity and cleanliness of the garages tanks where fuel is stored are important. Contaminated fuel with dirt, water or oil happens sometimes and this is worst  for the engine. I have bad experience filling up with 98 from esso garage in London, the car was almost impossible to drive, that bad quality, I had to fill up ASAP with petrol from another place and use some additives to clean the fuel system. Lesson learned, never again higher octane petrol from not so reputable place. Just had a bottle of wynns injector cleaner in for my next two days of driving as preventative maintenance against deposits built up. 👍

[FROSTYBALLS]

A single bad experience of using higher octane fuel isn't the best to use as an example.  

Generally higher octane premium fuel such as V-Power, Ultimate, Momentum, etc have better additive packages than standard fuel - so should help keep the engine cleaner.

I use premium fuel when we're going on holiday which usually means 300 miles of motorway driving, plus on the odd occasion I use supermarket fuels, I use premium rather than standard. Not interested in whether or not it gives better economy. 

Also in the UK, from September standard fuel will be E10 and premium will remain at E5. For those who want better economy, the premium E5 should give slightly better economy than the E10. 

Previously on these forums, some owners who regularly use premium fuel think their cars do run better. Subjective - possibly - but at the end of the day use whichever fuel you want to, there are no rights or wrongs in this. 

[TonyHSD]

You are right, single bad experience it’s not the best example although has not been only once but many times on few different cars including hybrids. I use around 100 ltr of petrol per week and got my thoughts and only sharing with you., no doubt everyone has its best preferences. 👍 

[MyOpinionIsWorthless]

I found using Vpower in a Prius (yeah I know) raised the power level by one notch with regard to acceleration   

eco becomes norm , norm becomes power , power mode = a very nice pull away 🙂 

clean premium fuels work just as well without the power boost 

steer well clear of Tesco standard fuel in the winter it’s very nasty

[Aygo321]

Until now I have only used high octane on my 2016 aygo, this because in Denmark Shells V-Power (octane 99) includes a bunch of great additives.
Further more octane 95 has (again in Denmark) now 10% bio-ethanol, whereas octane 99 or higher only has 5% or less.
This is in general no problem if you run your car daily, but if the gas is to be standing still for a longer period of time (like 4 months or more), the gas will go bad.

Even though I drive my car at least once a week, I like the idea that it wont go bad AT ALL and that it gets a bunch of medicine, so I pay a few extra bucks when filling up the little Aygo 🙂

[WazWii]

So to be clear in the UK, the Toyota Aygo mark 2 (2014 onwards) can take premium unleaded? That is all types of premium unleaded? I get confused at all the different brand names and numbers. I thought it was simply called 98 RON?

I have been using standard unleaded so far but want to start topping up with premium now and then and I am just wondering that when I pop into my local BP the next time I can put any premium unleaded fuel in and that I do not need to worry about anything going wrong.

[FROSTYBALLS]

Going back a number of years, Toyota have only stated minimum requirements as regards fuel for their cars - eg. 95RON. So whether or not you use a higher octane is your choice.

[Tomv]

I don't know if it's the same in UK, but in my country premium fuels (98 and 100 octanes) use ETBE instead of ordinary  bio ethanol. 
ETBE doesn't absorb water, last longer in your tank before it goes bad. It's also recommended for cars, mowers, motorcycles etc. that are not used through winter. 

Also if you want to see if you car runs better on 98 and 100 octanes you have to use it for longer time. Engine adapts quickly to 95 fuels to prevent knocking but adaption to 98 and 100 takes longer before the ECU is sure it can change the ignition timing advance. Engine knocking is the reason why turbo charged engines benefits more from 98 and 100 fuels

My experience with 100 octane is lower fuel consumption and engine is more silent, but only in winter. No difference in sommer for me.

[Guest]

11 hours ago, Tomv said:

Engine adapts quickly to 95 fuels to prevent knocking but adaption to 98 and 100 takes longer before the ECU is sure it can change the ignition timing advance.

That's assuming that the engine management software allows a range of timing adjustment that will allow the higher octane to be of benefit - if that were correct then members would have reported a performance benefit from using higher octane fuels, which I have not seen posted nor experienced myself in my bugs (but have definitely experienced in other cars I have owned which can adjust the timing to take benefit of the higher octane).

That suggests the benefits from higher octane fuels comes not from their higher octane per se but from their different additive mixtures (allowing a cleaner burn) and possibly the different methanol mix - which will become more obvious when UK 95 octane becomes E10 from September with 98/99 octane remaining as E5.

[Chris Boddum]

In Denmark, we already use E10 in 95 octane petrols and E5 in 100 octane (say Shell V-Power). I'm not really sure if the ethanol content has anything to say in regards to the performance, but I'm sure it's the best to use E5 if it takes a while to use a full tank. 

[Tomv]

9 hours ago, PetrolDave said:

That's assuming that the engine management software allows a range of timing adjustment that will allow the higher octane to be of benefit - if that were correct then members would have reported a performance benefit from using higher octane fuels, which I have not seen posted nor experienced myself in my bugs (but have definitely experienced in other cars I have owned which can adjust the timing to take benefit of the higher octane).

The timing with higher octane is change to prevent  low speed pre ignition (LSPI) not to gain more power. LSPI is quite bad thing for turbo charged and high compression rate petrol engines. I have seen some power charts of engines running with 95 and 98 octanes. No noticeable  power gain  for 1.4 47kW atmospheric engine. 1.8 110kW turbo charged got about 3kW more power (not noticeable imho) but was able to  provide higher torque from lower rpm.

In case of Aygo I think the main benefit is cleaner engine because of the additive mixtures.

[WazWii]

On 6/10/2021 at 8:38 PM, FROSTYBALLS said:

Going back a number of years, Toyota have only stated minimum requirements as regards fuel for their cars - eg. 95RON. So whether or not you use a higher octane is your choice.

So I can just pull into any BP petrol station (or indeed any Esso or Shell) and put any petrol premium fuel in? I don't want to damage anything. At the moment I am getting 64 MPG from the Aygo and I am curious to see how premium fuel compares. Also keen to know what effect it has on engine noise and performance, if any of course. 

[FROSTYBALLS]

28 minutes ago, WazWii said:

So I can just pull into any BP petrol station (or indeed any Esso or Shell) and put any petrol premium fuel in?

Yes - as long as whatever fuel you use meets the minimum requirement of 95 RON. We've used premium fuel at times in both cars for years. May not be much difference in economy, but, as I said previously, I'm not interested in that.

[WazWii]

On 6/21/2021 at 1:57 PM, FROSTYBALLS said:

Yes - as long as whatever fuel you use meets the minimum requirement of 95 RON. We've used premium fuel at times in both cars for years. May not be much difference in economy, but, as I said previously, I'm not interested in that.

Thanks!

[Guest]

This RAC article quotes research by 'What Car?' that E10 is 3% less efficient than E5 with smaller engined cars most affected, so if the price difference between E10 unleaded and E5 super unleaded is less than 3% it could actually be cheaper per mile to use E5 super unleaded (from September 2021)!

What is E10 fuel and how will it affect you?