Let’s Face It Do You Even Need a Fuel Additive?
by Robert Sanborn on Tue, Jun 13, 2023, who was a member of the STLE Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers for 15 years.
Thanks to the government’s many emission controls, and which car manufacturers struggle to meet mileage requirements, new engines have deposit issues. This along with quality issues of some gasoline’s–especially those containing ethanol, one should consider using a fuel additive beyond those found in gasoline. Engine repair centers have consistently documented carbon buildup in combustion chambers, injectors, and the backside of valves. With today’s engines engineered with ultra tight clearances, and with drivers performing lots of short trips, deposits are inevitable. For these reasons car manufacturers developed an industry wide standard called TOP TIER gasoline. The only problem is, not all gasoline retailers purchase the more expensive Top Tier gasoline so deposits occur. The public thinks gas is gas but not true!
What Fuel Additives Are Most Effective?
There are several types of fuel additives namely GAS TREATMENTS, INJECTOR CLEANERS, and COMPLETE FUEL SYSTEM TREATMENTS.
Gas Treatments: Are normally the lowest priced additives as they contain the least amount of effective detergents and other additives and must be used with Every Fill Up! If you forget, or run out and need gas, deposits will occur. In our opinion too much to remember and a waste of time. Note: Normally these products use the chemical polyisobutene (PIB).
Injector Cleaners: Many do an effective job of keeping the important gasoline delivery injectors clean, but they fail to clean the combustion chamber deposits and gasoline direct injection (GDI) deposits’ that form on the back side of valves. In 2008 only 2.3% of cars had GDI, but in 2016 it grew to 50% so deposits’ are not going away but getting worse. These products often contain the chemical polyisobutylene amine (PIBA).
Complete Fuel System Treatments: These products contain additives to address the Complete Fuel System, including the combustion chamber, injectors, alcohol in ethanol, and a special anti wear additive that migrates into the oil protecting valves and provides mileage improvement even in new cars. These benefits are above and beyond those contained in Top Tier gas, which contain the minimum detergency standard developed by the car manufacturers known as the Lowest Additive Concentration (LAC). Such products contain as their main ingredient a chemical called polyetheramine (PEA). SFR’s ProTecta Complete Fuel System Treatment cleans the fuel system in ONE TANKFUL and even improves mileage as documented by major oil companies testing. One has to be careful with these products as often additive companies advertise that their product contains PEA, but in such small amounts it’s not effective. SFR’s ProTecta Complete Fuel System Treatment contains the maximum recommended amount of PEA as recommended by major oil company testing.
Who Primarily Develops Fuel Additives?
Oil companies with their vast personnel in their additive divisions create most of the products on the market today. More importantly, due to EPA Regulations concerning emissions, companies must Register their products with the EPA, which costs huge amounts of capital to develop. Even though companies advertise their own products 99% have been developed by the majors. These include Oronite, which is Chevron’s additive division; Infinneum tied to Exxon, and companies like Lubrizol owned by Warren Buffet’s company who did 6.5 billion dollars in revenues last year.
Why Do The Oil Companies Not Sell Aftermarket
Additives And Are Even Against Them? Oil companies have a major conflict of interest in that they want to invent the very best products, but car manufacturers need to sell cars and put limits on what specifications can be used for vehicle obsoletion reasons. Even more ironic, since car manufacturers are the oil companies major customer, the oil companies will always say the specification for cleaning is the very best that the car manufacturer claims not to jeopardize their sales. But on the other hand, since the oil companies invent products that greatly exceed the specification when meeting the car manufacturers requirements, they sell to the aftermarket additive companies. In addition, they share their tremendous volume of testing data to prove the efficiency of the products they develop. They produce these testing documents showing a range of effectiveness. The products that the major oil companies produce always exceed the specifications set by the car manufacturers, which the industry agrees on.
Why Are There So Many Fuel Additives Available?
There is a simple answer and logic to this situation. Since oil companies spend such a large amount of resources in sophisticated engine testing to develop such products for a general specification such as motor oil such as API SN motor oil warranty standard. Because all this very expensive testing has been created, marketing companies sell their products under their own name. Where it gets dicey, is that, they aren’t really in the business–doing testing and extensive field studies, they often misrepresent the product claims. What is done by many, if not most of the aftermarket additive companies, they use the oil companies data inaccurately thus making false claims. Many aftermarket additive companies do it on purpose for profit margin reasons. When the oil companies develop a product they always show testing data in a range. In other words, in a fuel additive they will show effectiveness using 30-70%. The aftermarket additive companies sometimes use the minimum dosage but make the highest claims. This is false and why so many people think additives don’t work as there aren’t enough chemicals in the product to see its effectiveness. Even further, some companies will realize that polyetheramine (PEA) is the most effective, so they only put in a trace amount to be able to list on their label and make unrealistic claims. This has been the case in many products I’ve seen over the last 30 years that I’ve been in the business. We pledge that SFR products will always meet the maximum standards as developed by us and the oil companies. Let’s face it additives usually do not show tremendous results immediately, but over time. For this reason, it is our goal to give the customer the very best with no product dilution. This many times comes at the expense of many products with a cheaper price point, but SFR has always held to a full strength product without compromise. That’s why so many of our distributors have been with the company for 20 years plus, as they can count on reliable products to provide to our customers.
Robert Sanborn
Lubrication Specialist