Morning all

when I booked my MOT the garage asked if I wanted a Fuel Saver Service at the same time which covers:

– Cleans the entire fuel system including injectors
– Reduces emission of hazardous exhaust gases
– Improves combustion
– Increases cetane number and restores power and performance
– Prevents fuel system corrosion
– Eliminates rough idling and engine hesitation

Car is a 58 Focus 1.6 diesel estate with 77k.

They said to let them know on the day, is it worthwhile or snake oil?

Chemicals in the tank by the sounds of it. And how much are they wanting for this “service”

so they pour in a can of some sort of engine cleaner?

How much are they charging for the pouring bit?

(I add a bottle of Wynn’s every month to my clapped out old S-Max, so not saying that’s not worth it, just intrigued how much the ‘service’ element is)

http://www.halfords.com/motoring/engine-oils-fluids/fuel-oil-additives/wynns-injector-cleaner-for-diesel-engines-325ml

So effectively posh Red X at a premium cost; £30.

A great big can of red-ex (or equivalent).

Depends on the condition of the engine, a colleague recently stripped the EGR on his car (DI petrol, but same principal as a diesel it just has spark plugs), removed 10 years of accumulated carbon and put it back, and got 20% more mpg out of an afternoon’s work. Fuel cleaners wouldn’t touch that sort of crap (they only clean upto the point they burn off in the combustion chamber).

OTOH, I thought my focus (petrol) wasn’t being as economical as I remember it being (40mpg where it used to take effort to get it below 42). A few tanks of expensive petrol and it’s back to doing 44-45mpg on the motorway. It doesn’t have an EGR though, and the petrol keeps the inlet valves nice and clean unlike DI or diesel.

I’d just treat it to some expensive fuel once in a while, it’s basically the same as the stuff in the can just at less of a premium.

Injectors can only be cleaned properly by removing them and have them cleaned ultrasonically and the spray pattern and volume checked before and after. Its a job not many people do but it can have big benefits after a car is a few years old.

My garage put in Fotre during each service of my 56 plate 1.6D focus. The one with the PSA engine. didnt seem to stop it eating its turbo and DPF failure. i made it last 120K which was good by all accounts!

Could also be a Terraclean type service? Mate of mine tried this when his wife’s 1.6 Focus had a fueling issue, (can’t remember the detail). He’s a pretty pragmatic sort of bloke, but it sorted the problem and he was impressed.

£30 seems a bit cheap for that though.

It could have been right up to the point where they said it increases the cetane .

Forte and the like are under a 10er a can at the factors

– Cleans the entire fuel system including injectors

Crap from fuel lines then [potentially] gets to the injectors where it causes more problems than it’s worth.

Potentially 😉

It’s worth chucking some red-X through the engine from time to time. Not sure I’d pay someone else to do so unless it failed the MOT on emissions – I was surprised at the effect on emissions on an older car to be honest (from marginal MOT fail to comfortable pass).

£30 seems, er, steep.

So snake oil it is, I’ll just chuck some Wynns through instead 😉

Cheers all