Dodgy Fuel
We had a blissfull time on our last trip to Europe; Switzerland/French Alps etc. Thoroughly relaxed until we hit Belgium on the way back up. I won't go into detail but the last 48hours of our holiday undid all the good of the previous three weeks. The car
broke basically, we were towed to a Landrover garage ; the estimate for the repair was €3000 for a fuel pump! As they didn't have the part, we were advised by the nice mechanic to use our rescue; we did and Red Pennant were superb. ANYWAY, we got home, had
to use the car which was cutting out intermittently and all of a sudden it didn't. We were advised by Landrover, that as the problem had ceased, that we must have bought rubbish fuel somewhere (we cannot remember where but we think we filled up in Lyon). Just
a word or caution - if your car starts playing up after refuelling consider the option that the fuel you just bought was a dodgy batch.
Anyone else experienced this?
Comments
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We did, but it's a few years ago now (2011), and fortunately we didn't need to call out the breakdown company. Our car was refuelled at a supermarket, and about ten minutes later started to 'miss' and run very badly, blowing out lots of black smoke eventually, and coughing and chugging along. However, we did manage to get back home, and took the car to our local garage (Diesel Dave) who put it right. His opinion was the same as your garage gave - dodgy fuel.
At the time there were several other reports of similar problems, and I posted about it on forums (though perhaps not this one as it didn't exist then).
See here
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We had the same thing happen to us picked up some contaminated diesel and engine stopped after 2 miles. Was towed to a garage by ADAC and a new Filter was fitted but still had intermittent problems till we took the car into Kia Garage in Austria when another
filter was changed under the back seat. It still coughed a bit when in the mountains on steep inclines. But when we got home after a few days we were travelling down the A14 the engine coughed once and never a problem again.must have cleared in an injector
we think. . The Austrian garage said the cause was fungal virus that Diesel can get. We had to laugh because our Austrian friend said the garage knew what it was when he rang to book the car in and told us it was "Mushrooms in the Tank".its been a standing
joke ever since.DianneT .
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I dealt professionally with this in fuel storage and it can be a very serious problem; it happens where fuel has some amount of moisture present allowing bacteria and a fungus cladosporium resinae to live and breed in support of each other. Hardly mushrooms, as it forms great clumps of jelly like clots and in big enough tanks needs shovelling out.
It produces corrosive by products that can cause fuel system damage but rarely in vehicles, aircraft or ships where its ability to clog things like filters up become evident generally long before those large clumping issues are encountered.
So, apart from grinding to a halt and needing to change fuel filters and refuel you are not likely to have suffered any lingering damage, provided you kept using rather than laid up the vehicle.You are very much less likely to encounter this issue with supermarket fuelling as the tank laying stagnant is a requirement, so low turn over, less frequently used and replenished fuel stations are best avoided. Therefore, larger town supermarkets and other high volume frequently refilled stations present minimal risks.
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Most yacht chandlers sell an additive for diesel fuel tanks to alleviate this problem. Don't know if it works but I never had a problem with the yacht and the fuel used to sit around in the tank for quite a while. Mostly used Port Solent or Camper and Nicholson
marina at the entrance to Portsmouth harbour so I would imagine a fair turnover of fuel there as well.0 -
I had my Discovery MoT'd a few days after returning from France via Santander. The last fill with diesel was a small filling station near Bilbao, just off the A8 and that was what was in the tank for the MoT. The car ran perfectly well.
I was astonished that the emissions, which had always - for 7 years - been well below 1.0 l/m (no idea what this stands for) had jumped to 2.14 l/m. Still within limits but higher than I would have liked.
I have put this down to the Spanish diesel although I have no direct evidence.
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Most yacht chandlers sell an additive for diesel fuel tanks to alleviate this problem. Don't know if it works but I never had a problem with the yacht and the fuel used to sit around in the tank for quite a while. Mostly used Port Solent or Camper and Nicholson
marina at the entrance to Portsmouth harbour so I would imagine a fair turnover of fuel there as well.Write your comments here...Only ever experienced it once, and I suspect we picked the fuel up in Braye. Engine lost power coming in to the Beaulieu and we had to short tack most of the way up the river! It has become much more of a problem since bio fuel
blends were introduced.0
