A smoother drive?

Let me just say on the onset that I'm not a car expert. I can tell different models or makes of cars apart, but if you asked me how powerful a car was, or what year model a certain car is, I wouldn't be able to tell you. Neither am I an engine expert. If I took apart my car's engine, I might as well buy a new car as I'd never be able to put the engine back together. Oh, and one last thing - I'm in no way affiliated to any of the brands I'm going to mention later in this post, though I wish I was so that I'd get paid megabucks for it.

Okay, now that that's out of the way - let me ask in introduction what petrol brand do you use? When I first got my car about 9 years ago, I was a Shell user through and through. I guess it was because my parents used it and nothing else, so I was just sort of continuing the tradition. Yes, yes...lousy reason, I know but that's what it is.

But, then a friend told me about how Esso fuels were much better - your car had more power, and the drive was smoother. I didn't try it then and there, but I eventually did. And what did I find out? True enough the car responded better, and the drive was smoother. It was almost as if I had just had the car serviced. And ever since then I used Esso almost exclusively. But, just last week I filled up with Shell again as no Esso stations were open on my way to work, and the car was running dangerously low on fuel. And since I'd pass a Shell station on my way, so that's where I filled up. No perceptible difference...

until...

with the tank about half full, I filled up again at Esso yesterday. So, in my tank was half Shell, half Esso. I can't say whether the drive felt any different then, but just this evening, it did - quite perceptibly. The car was quieter, and smoother. I told my wife that it felt just like the first time I filled up with Esso.

So, here's the thing. Each fuel company promotes its own fuels saying how good they are and I suppose each adds their own special formula of fuel additive as well. But, I'm just wondering if mixing those two will actually give 'better' performance. My wife suggested that I try filling up using alternate brands next time. I suppose I'll try just to see if this continues.

Now, I must say that what I've said is just based on my observation and 'feel'. It'd be interesting to know if anyone else has a similar experience. Drop me a comment if you do or don't think that mixing different brands of fuel has resulted in better performance for your car.

It could be just that I'm imagining things.

Here we go again...

Decided to settle our credit card bills today, thinking we’d beat the rush of people when payday comes. But, we ran into another kind of rush today. The rush for petrol…again! In case you haven’t heard, word is that all petrol stations will go on strike for 3 days starting tomorrow. The reason? From what I gathered, it is because the government refuses to allow the owners of petrol kiosks to push the 4% credit charges to customers. Too bad I didn’t bring along my camera to get some pic of the whole affair.

So, there we were as a family, thinking what a breeze it’d be doing our errands when we saw a long, a very long queue right as we coming out of the access road from our taman. It was 5 pm then, and it was too late for Tshung Tsin to have finished school, and too early afternoon session schools to have finished. So we took the Tuaran road to head to KK. And we saw another queue! This time from Kian Kok right up till Sunny Garden! Luckily that was in the opposite direction towards Tuaran.

So that got us wondering….what’s the cause? My wife’s car is the family car, and she was almost running on empty. The light was blinking incessantly, a reminder that we needed to pump petrol soon, very soon. There was an Esso station at Sunny Garden, but it was closed for some kind of renovation or repairs. So, we decided to just head on to KK as there was also an Esso station near where we were heading, the one near Maybank. Along the way, we saw Jalan Kolam also backlogged with cars…

It was pretty smooth sailing apart from the usual traffic snarl at that time. But upon hitting Jalan Pantai, there was another jam. And it was long! So we took the back way of the shophouses right up till Maybank, and then we stopped dead in our tracks. It was a gridlock. No one was moving. The cause: the queue at the Esso station, our destination. My face fell. The light never stopped blinking. Fen ran out to find out what was going on and that’s how we knew about the supposed strike.

Rather than keep the engine running and run the risk of running out of petrol, we somehow managed to manoeuvre and go the other way to find a parking. We found one soon enough, parked and walked to the three banks to pay our bills. Stopped by Tong Hing and Home and Garden as well. And when we walked back to the car to put some things in, we saw a car we had seen earlier in the queue in the exact position before. It hadn’t moved! And easily 30 minutes had passed by then.

So, rather than being stuck in the jam, we decided to walk around for a bit. Went for dinner, walked around Wisma Merdeka and then walked back to the car. Jam was still there for that Esso station. But driving home wasn’t a problem. Jalan Kolam was already clear, and so we figured we’d just go ahead and pump. We waited in line for about 15 minutes, pumped to the max and drove home. At that time, two pumps were already out of petrol.

While filling up the car, I asked the attendant whether the news was true. He confirmed my suspicions. There were only rumours. His boss told him that they’d be open for tomorrow; there were no plans for a strike.

I don’t understand why people would spread hearsay without first confirming it with a reliable source. I suspect the cause for today’s mess was spread through sms. And this will not be the first time such a thing has happened, nor will it be the last, I think. SMS is a good thing, but responsible use of it is better.

Oh well…

And did you know that a full tank for a Proton Iswara 1.3 now costs RM112? Yikes! That’s RM50 more than previously. Ouch!

Read here and here for other bloggers' view on the event.

p.s. Is it just me, or am I facing a jam of some kind as well with blogspot. My pages seem to load very slowly…