Bad fuel at petrol station

Bicycle

I don't think its a coincidence that the same botanical reference is being cited in all cases. Our situation was most likely a bad case of the botanicals as well.

My husband bought his car new, the car was about 6 years old, and he had not changed his driving patterns.

CeilingFly

Duckegg2018 wrote: »

I've driven around 7000 km in 2 and a half months. Would you consider that much? My family tell me I'm always on the road.
Are you saying that sludge builds up if you continuously fill up without letting the tank drop to nearly empty? I thought the opposite was the case.

I've a 2013 car - it has 345,000km on the clock!! I never care where I buy fuel, and in 30+ years driving never an issue.

Always told to allow tank go close to empty and fill up - meant to push particles out over time rather than build them up.

I did have an issue with home heat system - builder never put the tank on a slight slope and the pump needed replacing twice before this was realised as the issue as the sludge in the filter caused a block.

Drained the oil tank and it had about 5 litres of sludge built up over 14 years - but at about 1,000 litres of kerosene per year, its a fair whack of sludge that is in fuel naturally.

Though this suggests its makes no difference.



It's possibly is a filter / fuel pump issue - but almost zero chance its an issue with one tank of fuel for the simple reason above that you'd have hundreds of cases and would certainly make local if not national headlines (as a case in the UK did some years ago).

Duckegg2018

I don't know if this is relevant-the oil life monitor went down 25% in the 7000 or so km that I drove in the 2 and a half months since I bought the car. Would that be a normal rate decrease in oil life? I rarely travelled on motorways during that time, so average speeds of 70-90 km/h depending on road quality, except for where the limit is lower.

Also, can a Garage refuse to hand over a copy of the service history of a car just purchased from them, on the grounds of data protection, and that I didn't own the car when it was serviced? This has alarm bells ringing for me. Should I be concerned?

whiterebel

Duckegg2018 wrote: »

I don't know if this is relevant-the oil life monitor went down 25% in the 7000 or so km that I drove in the 2 and a half months since I bought the car. Would that be a normal rate decrease in oil life? I rarely travelled on motorways during that time, so average speeds of 70-90 km/h depending on road quality, except for where the limit is lower.

If it’s like mine, it just ticks down to 30k Kms when it has been reset after a service. If you have 30k service intervals, 25% would be about 7500kms.

Duckegg2018

It was serviced just before 15000 km in January 2018. Its first service. Then I bought it. I thought it sounded like a high percentage decrease in oil life?

CeilingFly

Duckegg2018 wrote: »

Also, can a Garage refuse to hand over a copy of the service history of a car just purchased from them, on the grounds of data protection, and that I didn't own the car when it was serviced? This has alarm bells ringing for me. Should I be concerned?

Data protection me arse. Block out/remove the name and address and that's sorted.

In the good old days a garage would fill in a service schedule in the service book with all details.

I think you may be getting to the issue.

Duckegg2018

Block out/remove the name and address and that's sorted.[/quote]


The thing is, I actually know who owned the car before me, and the salesman had no problem telling me his name when I enquired about the car before I bought it.

Duckegg2018

OmegaGene wrote:

What’s the service interval on your car ?

It's a 171. That was the first service.

Duckegg2018

OmegaGene wrote:

Yes I understand that but you said the oil life thing dropped 25% and you think this is quick, that all depends at what mileage the next service is due 28k miles is probably correct so the 25% drop is correct

Yeah, that sounds about right. My last car was an 05 and didn't have an oil life indicator. Thanks.

Hellrazer

Ive been following this thread and if you want an opinion of someone 20+ years in the motor trade I don't think your problem was with one tank of dodgy fuel.

You hear so many people saying that their car packed up because of dodgy or contaminated fuel but in reality Ive only ever seen it a couple of years back when the fuel was "stretched" with kerosene or people fill up with petrol instead of diesel.
The symptoms of the fuel stretching were a misfire in the engine with the pistons completely carboned up some to the point that the piston would not move up or down in the cylinder. I think I had about 5 of them in the workshop at the time this was going and every one of those cars had been fuelled up in the midlands and west of Ireland.
While this sounds like that it wasn't one fill that did it -- it was a gradual build up over a few weeks or months.

The manufacturers refused warranty on these and insurance companies paid out in some instances.

This sounds to me more like a coincidence that you are putting down to dodgy fuel. As for whether a service station can get fuel tested within one week--absolutely possible.I can get a sample tested in 2 days.Id imagine a service station could get it done in about the same time.

Also the fact that it took 3 days for the problems to appear. Id expect the issues if the fuel was as contaminated as you say to appear almost immediately.
The holes in injectors are so tiny nowadays that the slightest bit of contamination would make them misfire fairly quickly. 3 days sounds like a lot.


You say its a petrol and it only has a fuel filter in the tank??
I doubt it.Theres usually a fuel filter along the fuel lines but unlike a diesel it doesn't require changing as often maybe 150k rather than 60 to 80 like a diesel.

If I were in your position Id handle it like this.
Get the fuel samples from your mechanic. The Lab is in Eastwall that does fuel testing.
Make sure its in clean uncontaminated containers and split it into 3 or 4 samples.
Send 2 off for testing and keep the other 2 safe.
When the results come back and if they are showing contamination then get a solicitor involved.
Keep the 2 samples safe and these are for your solicitor to get tested independently.


However Ive a feeling they will come back ok.
If that's the case then you need to find out exactly what work was done on the car.
You`ll need the diagnostic logs and the old parts if they changed any....you mentioned cleaning?

At the very least the fuel filter should have been changed..not the one in the tank but the one on the fuel line.

Have you by any chance topped up the oil?

These new oil reminders that show percentages are throwing a lot of people off.

This measures the quality of the oil and not the quantity

Ive had people throw 5 litres into an engine that has the correct oil level because they believe that they are out of oil or running low on oil when its reading a certain percentage. This is blocking up catalytic converters and again would give similar symptoms to what you have experienced.

Im just throwing it out there as you have already questioned the percentage shown on the dash.

Hope the above helps.






Can I ask what make and model it is?