Thread: Is one diesel better than another?

All fuels are definitely not equal!

I know that all fuel has to conform to the relevant standards, but I found it quite noticable the difference in performance between the different diesel brands.

Filling up at the Caltex down the road from home the car's performance was on a par with a slug carrying some very heavy shopping (which was typical, as I had a Caltex fuelcard!), but using the Shell or Mobil servos on the way home from work, I often forgot that I'd filled up elsewhere and had to lift up on the loud pedal.
Worse still was the local 7-11. I was sure it was more than 50% water.

Shell is very good.

Caltex reduces my range by over 100km

I had heard that BP Ultimate Diesel was the best available.

Guess what. They don't sell it in Vic

I used the BP Ultimate unleaded in the litle 2 seater and have to say that the performance seemed noticibly better than the other Performace Unleadeds available.

Originally Posted by land864

I had heard that BP Ultimate Diesel was the best available.

Guess what. They don't sell it in Vic

I used the BP Ultimate unleaded in the litle 2 seater and have to say that the performance seemed noticibly better than the other Performace Unleadeds available.

You can get it at BP Wyndham Vale 210 Ballan Rd, although it's a bit of a hike for a fill up. (According to their website.)

I reckon Shell gives me the worst, BP the best. I don't use Caltex as the new Vortex blend is probably only as good as BPs ULSD and they charge more. Best performance I find for a Tdi comes from Aviation Turbine or Kerosene prepared to Land Rover's manual for Africa.

Down this way Shell is the worst. Caltex and Mobil get me further on a tank.

Originally Posted by B92 8NW

Best performance I find for a Tdi comes from Aviation Turbine or Kerosene prepared to Land Rover's manual for Africa.

Pray tell??????

I always find this argument amusing. A large percentage of the fuels retailed in this country arrive by ship from Singapore. The ships discharge identical products, from the same bunker, to all of the local oil companies. Talk about the placibo effect.

Yep. To a certain extent.

Each ship delivers semi-refined fuel. Each company gets a load of light crude and they then process accordingly.
I very much doubt if shipping companies ship pre-refined petrol: petrol has more explosive force than dynamite, ounce for ounce.....

The companies (BP, Caltex, Castrol, etc) each refine or receive refined fuel from a 3rd party: BP might even buy "raw" petrol from Caltex to reduce the cost of having to set up a refinery.

They will then add their additives and sell the petrol to us.

Same happens with diesel, paraffin, kerosene, etc.