Shell Malaysia organizes V-Power 97 Road Trip
Shell Malaysia opened up its refinery in Port Dickson to the prying eyes of Malaysian motoring journalists yesterday in the Shell V-Power 97 Road Trip. Participating journalists made the trip in their own cars (test cars in some cases) powered by Shell’s V-Power 97 petrol. Regretfully, we were unable to personally attend this trip due to prior commitments.
In his opening address En Azman Ismail explained, “The fuels landscape in Malaysia has undergone a number of changes over the past year. Now more than ever, an understanding of what is the right fuel for your car or driving behaviour, is key as motorists have a choice of purchasing RON95 (Shell FuelSave), RON97 (Shell V-Power 97) or even the country’s only premium fuel Shell V Power Racing. Shell has organised this fuels engagement to provide journalists who speak of fuels, an opportunity to raise any queries they have on fuels. It is our hope that we are able to help our journalists develop a deeper understanding of fuels differentiation.”
“Everyday, millions of drivers choose Shell from the 46,000 Shell-branded fuel stations in more than 90 countries. In Malaysia alone, we have more than 900 Shell stations located nationwide that offers a range of fuel to meet the motoring needs of Malaysians. At Shell we know that all fuels are not the same. That is why we have made it an integral part of our business to continuously invest in research and development to ensure that our customers benefit from the latest breakthroughs in fuel technology,” said En Azman.
During the trip, Shell’s ‘Dr Fuel’ Eric Holthusen also conducted a briefing on the abilities of Shell’s friction modification technology (FMT), which functions as a lubricant of sorts to help reduce engine friction. This fuel technology is available in both Shell V-Power 97 and Shell V-Power Racing petrol.
For the Malaysian consumer, the burning and crucial question for them when visiting the pumps is simply which fuel grade to choose. This is less of a problem for diesel vehicles, as there is only one grade of diesel fuel to choose from, although from personal experience, we can tell you that the fuel filler differs slightly between diesel passenger cars and trucks.
Owners of petrol-powered vehicles have RON 95 and RON 97 grade fuels to choose from. It is often believed that RON 97 petrol gives better performance. This statement only holds true for engines tuned to run on high-octane petrol. Differences between these two fuel grades on engines that are already tuned to run low-octane fuel are minimal and most probably psychological.
For the lack of a better term, high-octane petrol has a lower tendency to detonate pre-maturely. Engines that operate high compression ratios need to watch out for this, along with aging engines that have thick carbon deposits on its cylinder walls. Otherwise, RON 95 and RON 97 fuels can even be mixed without adverse effects, so long as the engine using the fuel was tuned to run RON 95 petrol or less from the start.
The main problem with fuels sold in Malaysia, and this is an issue that has disappointingly been receiving minimal exposure, is that both petrol and diesel coming out of our pumps continue to contain unacceptably high levels of sulphur. A big deal was made when we upgraded our fuel quality from Euro 1 to Euro 2M, but the sad truth is that most of the world are at least at Euro 4, and Euro 6 is already around the corner. Our government has recently stated its commitment in promoting the growth of Green Technology in Malaysia. They can start by giving us clean fuel.
Pictures: Official Shell release.
