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Filled up with Shell's premium grade unleaded yesterday just to see what difference it makes. Had a good ride and the bike went well - but then it generally does.

So - what grade do people use and who notices any difference ?

I've always used good old std unleaded. I did try the premium unleaded when I put the SL chip in the bike and immediately noticed "absolutely nothing"

If there is an improvement I couldn't feel or sense it.

IMHO save your money for suspension mods that's an area you can feel an improvement

F9

I believe Ride magazine did an article on this, and their conclusion was it did make a difference.

Note very helpful I know, but might jog someone's memory who doesn't just read the magazine in Tesco's.

gazuk wrote:I believe Ride magazine did an article on this, and their conclusion was it did make a difference.

Note very helpful I know, but might jog someone's memory who doesn't just read the magazine in Tesco's.

It might, in theory, make a difference.
It might make a difference that can be measured on a dyno.
It might make a difference you can demonstrate in a test on a drag strip.

BUT

How much of the time are our throttles fully to the stop and we can't get the same effect by just cracking it open a bit further?

OK in the past I did have a reputation as someone who needed a switch rather than a throttle but the grunt of the Falco has greatly reduced the amount of time that the throttle's hard against the stop (or maybe I'm just becoming an old wus).

Ride also did an article on how much of the throttle was actually used in normal riding. I think it was between 30% - 40%. So now they tend to highlight changes/mods that affect this area.

Used to buy Ride religiously every month, now just read it in Tesco's.

Again, not a very helpful post

I don't think you'd notice any improvement on a litre bike.

Gio wrote:I don't think you'd notice any improvement on a litre bike.

meaning that you would on a small bike OR on a larger bike ?

Isn't it supposed to be for use in highly tuned, high compession engines? I thought that in most cars and bikes it made no difference at all.

I've tried it in my smoothness-is-everything quest and I noticed a small difference in that the bike did run slightly (say 5%) smoother, about the same difference as when I slotted in the K&N filter......I always use it now as I hardly get to use the bike due to work so the extra few pennies when filling up is never noticed, it certainly can't be any worse than std unleaded....or can it and I'm just insane?

TwinNut wrote:I've tried it in my smoothness-is-everything quest and I noticed a small difference in that the bike did run slightly (say 5%) smoother, about the same difference as when I slotted in the K&N filter......I always use it now as I hardly get to use the bike due to work so the extra few pennies when filling up is never noticed, it certainly can't be any worse than std unleaded....or can it and I'm just insane?

TN - what's the object of your smoothness is everything quest? Is it a general refinement or is it mainly to address the on/off effect at small throttle openings?

It's this small throttle opening stuff that annoys me most. I've not done much about it yet (apart from a 15t sprocket) but would like to sort it out. I'm thinking that a PCIII may be a key item .... but it aint cheap .....

Assuming that this is what you've been working on, what's worked for you?

Fausto wrote:

Gio wrote:I don't think you'd notice any improvement on a litre bike.

meaning that you would on a small bike OR on a larger bike ?

I can imagine if you're a shit hot rider on a 600 you might, by litre class I mean something of about that capacity and upwards. On my Blackbird I tried both standard unleaded and premium fuels, I couldn't spot any difference at all, it certainly didn't even give me more mileage either (which is one thing the oil companies bragged about) 's

I do notice the difference when I use Super unleaded fuel. it's small but my bike feels smother and the engine seems sweater and mileage from a tank is slightly better.
Commonly compression ratios were between 7.5-10 to 1 and 10 to one was considered a high compression ratio engine some years ago. These days petrol engines can have ratios in excess of 12 to 1 and run without lead additives things have improved with new engine design and better control using ECU's together with better additives.
I would always prefer to use Shell or BP fuels when filling my bike as the supermarket fuels can very in quality as recent events have proved.

Do any of you guys use an injector cleaner or fuel additives in your bike? opinions very as to their effectiveness but my seat of the pants dyno says yes. I use injector cleaner occasionally throughout the year when I service the bike or if the bike has been laid up for a time.

gazuk wrote:I believe Ride magazine did an article on this, and their conclusion was it did make a difference.

...but that the difference wasn't worth the extra cash, IIRC. Certainly for the increase tank range, it wasn't worth it. But then, who on here is bothered about tank range?

I did a diy controlled comparison some time ago and have used the 'super' since.
I also use Shell whenever it is available.

I seem to remember the evo magazine did a car test on the 'best' super unleaded using shell, esso and Tesco's 99RON. They tried it on a few different cars and it only made any real difference on a 250bhp impreza which gained ~20bhp on the dyno( using the tesco fuel!). It will only give a difference if the engine managment can adjust its timing to make use of the higher octane fuel. If you fill a car up that is designed to run on 99 you can feel a real performance drop if you use 95 (defo on my dad's Chimera). As far as I know the prilla ecu does not adjust so you'll get no performance change.