Morris Minor Owners Club

i just filled my car up with super for a change and what a difference i cannot believe its the same 1098 engine , idle now smooth ,no running ,on more power and the engine sounds so quiet and free running especially at speed ,

Out of curiousity... do you have an unleaded head, or do you use a lead additive?

I'll second that, Martin418. I use BP Ultimate in my everyday car and grabbed the wrong pump whilst filling the Morris. Now I find I have considerably improved response with the loud pedal!

Thirded. And it has the added benefit of not having any Ethanol in it so it's better for the car if not used so much in the winter like mine

Wow! That sounds interesting......I'll try it out next time I fill up!

it has an unleaded head

Years ago I used to put 5* in the Morris and tweak the timing - certainly ran well and stormed the hills!

I use it too, Maisie much prefers it and runs much better. As there is no ethanol it also cuts down the amount of water generated in the exhaust system, hence the amount of sooty muck that splutters out when cold.

Il give it a try next tank then!

biomed32uk wrote:I use it too, Maisie much prefers it and runs much better. As there is no ethanol it also cuts down the amount of water generated in the exhaust system, hence the amount of sooty muck that splutters out when cold.

Good to hear that people find it helps, although I must admit I tried it once and didn't notice any difference, and I couldn't justify the additional cost! The car always runs nicely as it is well set up . I'm intrigued by the comment regarding producing less water in the exhaust though - surely as petrol is made up of hydrocarbons, and the products of (pure) combustion are water and CO2, burning either ethanol or petrol in air isn't going to make a lot of odds to the amount of water produced. Or are you suggesting the oxygen molecule in ethanol that isn't present in whatever hydrocarbons are in petrol contributes to the formation of more water rather than an equal amount of CO2 and water? A-level chemistry was rather a long time ago for me...!

Just thought his may be of interest ref the point made on the ethanol addition in certain petrol grades -
Over the few recent years running, and also on behalf of my own local MMOC branch, I have volunteered to contact as many oil companies as possible, each time requesting information concerning latest information of ethanol addition in % terms across all of their individual grades of petrol. All of the brand companies I contacted eventually returned full information through their individual customer services depts. I was surprised to learn on the last contact that there was only one company that stated they do not add any ethanol at all to any grade of fuel as I too originally thought that in general super grades were said to be without ethanol. This company was Esso and it was solely their super grade that had no ethanol in certain counties. Every other company contacted did in fact state their entire range of grades all now contain ethanol .
(The highest addition in % of ethanol added I remember was actually Tesco brand, I particularly remember with their customer services that I had a return telephone call and the 'technical' advisor stated that our club should most definately be using the Tesco super with its comparatively high ethanol content as it burns incredibly 'hotter' than the vast majority of any other brand sold ! ) Esso did however clearly state that this was not across the entire country but limited to certain specific counties. I am lucky that one of those counties is Dorset were super grade Esso being the only company that has confirmed has no ethanol content is available and there is a local filling station within my area. I am due to contact the companies again in the new year to find out any annual ongoing change. Anyone is free to contact any of the oil companies customer service depts of course at any time, I generally found every company contacted willing to openly provide the information requested.
I used to use any super grade brand rather than standard grade and can certainly agree that my Minor felt that it performed better than on any lower brand grade, specifically starting up better from standing for any prolonged period much better. Now I know that Esso has confirmed to me that they definately do not add ethanol to their super grade in my immediate county and as long as this the case, I will simply choose to use Esso super grade as my own personal choice.

Think we did all this a few years ago under 'Supermarket petrol '? The perceived wisdom at the time was that it made no difference what you filled the tank with.... But all my old girls run better on the super unleaded and for the extra cost of a few quid a year,why wouldn't you do it?

I haven't used regular unleaded for a long time, as I know it can have more ethanol in it (In any case, the Midget needs super unleaded anyway). Recently I was advised to use an anti ethanol treatment, even with super unleaded. Modern petrols are far more volatile and "Go off" quicker. Millers do products to go in the fuel, for both in use cars and those being laid up.

As an update, I recall when my Midget was put on the rolling road, it was found that on Shell Optimax, the ignition could be advanced a tad more and this resulted in 110bhp but I decided on a slightly retarded setting and about 2 bhp less, rather than risk detonation.