About the octane number (RON in our case), they are very shy, they just compare it to the FuelSave stating, that Nitro+ is for performance and FuelSave is about fuel consumption.
I tanked a full tank (5 liters remained from the previous one). It's expensive like hell - 1.71 € / liter in Bratislava, Slovakia. I don't trust these fancy fuels but I was curious.
Results :
Indeed, after 5 - 6 km I felt a bit increase of performance. Nothing dramatic, maybe even a
placebo effect, but subjectively the car goes quicker after the gas pedal. I remembered myself on the feeling after using 102 (ROZ = RON) at Aral in Germany. It's simillar.
Fuel consumption depends hardly on the drive style. So I've tried to drive the same distance, around 120 km, same conditions 50/50 city/outside (no highways) with the same a bit more sportier style than cruising, but no speeding. With the regular RON 95, the fuel consumption was 11.2 litres/100km. Nitro+ required 10.8 litres. Interesting.
So the situation is : subjective feeling of more power and decreased consumption.
Is it really worth ?
If a regular petrol 98 costs around 1.50 € these days, with the above consumptions, 100 km costs 16.8 € and the same ride on Nitro+ costs 18.5 €. That is 1.7 € or ~10% more on 100 km. So in my case the lower fuel consumption doesn't balance the price.
Let's believe, it really cleans the engine more than regular fuel.
Is the fancy fuel really increasing the engine power ? I found a video regarding this :
The Subaru in the video is weaker than my Saab (275 hp), but it got 14 hp more. In the Subaru case it's 6% difference. In my Saab the 6% hp would be 16.5 hp more = 291.5 hp. (275 + 6%). Nice. And the 16 hp more are definitely to feel. Also it would indicate, that the fuel is at least RON 98 if not 100. But is it worth the money ?
As usual in these situations, some people don't care. I do. A price of 1.71 € / liter is too much. It stays similar as with the RON 100 V-Power - when I go driving longer distances, I buy it. Otherwise rather not. And until the price difference doesn't drops, it stays so. C'mon Shell, the new stuff is fine, but too expensive for what it offers.
Note : maybe in other countries the Nitro+ is distributed under another name. Pricing can be different. Also, I will continue to measure it. If something significantly changes, it will appear here.
Update : It's RON 100
Here we have RON95 and RON98. 98 is known as v-power by shell and I think BP have a RON100 in selected fuel stations. As I run a forum with tuned cars we certainly saw an increase in many good things, from consumption thru to performance. My Audi S3 was running 333bhp and performed perfectly on Shell v power that I never even dreamt of putting filthy 95 in! Price wise it's 140p per litre upwards
ReplyDeleteinteresting. meanwhile my consumption was going a bit up, but due to city drive only. I've read in some forum, that the fuel quality depends also how the station cares about cleaning of the underground fuel tanks. Depending on franchising type it is either done be franchiser or vendor, but in essence it is about people running the business.
Deleteafaik at Shell here we have fuelsave and v-power. V-Power RON 100 was on selected stations and imho this Nitro+ is a replacement/newer version of the V-Power 100.