16 replies to this topic

[Steve-O 2014]

How many miles will a bottle of castrol valve master last?

Trying to work out if its cheaper to get unleaded conversion or just use additives

Also is castrol the best to go with?

Thanks

[Midas Mk1]

I use Valvemaster plus with octance boost, honestly would just use that ( I cant have hardened seats anyway due to valve size)

 

Lasts a good few miles per bottle.

[CityEPete]

I used to buy a bottle or 2 at the NEC classic car show, you can work it out as from memory it's 25ml to 25 litres of fuel using the squeezy lid thing, a bottle is 250ml isnt it? (I'm in bed ill so I cant check!)

250 litres diveded by 4.54 equals 55.06 gallons
55 x 30 miles per gallon = 1650 miles a bottle.

[Cooperman]

That's what I use as well.
Most classic cars don't do enough miles to make hardened seats economic to fit.

[CityEPete]

I actually changed the head gasket on the 1098 in my moggy minor, I'd been using additive as no one knew if the gold seal lump was unleaded or not when I bought it, it wasn't once I decoked it, I decided to put it back on and keep using additive.

[cal844]

Shall be following this as I need to know what to use/how much :)

Edited by cal844, 25 January 2017 - 10:24 AM.

[Steve-O 2014]

Yea that's how I worked it out but thought almost 2000 miles from a £10 bottle seemed cheap compared to £150 odd for the conversion lol



I've been running without for 3 years with no problems but thought with the 295 head I would treat it better

Is castrol the stuff to go with? I noticed other brands as well some £5 - £6 a bottle etc

[42harry]

I used to use lead additive for a long time in my mini when it was my daily. Castrol i found was the best one and was convenient and easy to use with the squeezy top bit for measuring, the other brands do the same job for cheaper to be honest but the some lack the measuring tool.

 

The castrol costs £10 roughly and is 250ml and treats 250 litres of fuel,

A mini saloon tank is 7.5 Gallons = 34Litres so say you fill up 30 litres every time and use the additive then you should be able to get 8 and a bit tanks out of each Castrol bottle

 

All depends on how much you drive the car because in the long run the hardened valve seats will be cheaper after 120 Tanks worth of fuel but up untill that point the additive is the cheaper alternative, I eventually had hardened valve seats on my daily mini when i put a 12g295 head on it that had already had them fitted, I then noticed the other benefit of having the hardened valve seats is that its less messing about at the pump and quicker especially if its cold haha

[smurfomatic]

Buy Valvemaster plus in bulk from Ebay / Amazon and it works out even cheaper, I bought a box of 6 bottles ages ago and I've still got four of them in the shed...

[Dusky]

Depends on your right foot
I've seen a lot of old cars in my dad's garage and we only ever had one car converted to unleaded seats. The conversion cracked the head (302 Mustang head) so needless to say that I just use an additive, although it's probably not common for heads to crack.

[Ricewind]

I've seen it for £31.99 for thee bottles of valvemaster pluss (lead & boost) works out at 4.3p per letre of petrol. Does anyone know if this would be OK for a 1380 with a 13/1 compression ratio (or should I ask that on a new thread).

[slidehammer]

I had the heads on our minis converted as they were for my daughters and I wouldn't trust them to remember the additive. But when I get around to doing my own Mini I think I will just use an additive. One thing you do notice is how much difference super unleaded makes they like that those A series (I suppose its more like 4 star in octane rating, which is what they were made for)I did also change to phosphor bronze valve guides over the old cast iron (which no manufactures still use).

[CityEPete]

Some of the cheaper bottles work out more expensive if you look at mix ratio.

Castrol Valvemaster octane plus for me.

[59 Speed]

I use this:

http://www.halfords....multishot-500ml

http://www.ebay.co.u...AwAAOSwDk5T1lUp

Treats 500 litres.

I've not had the head off to check the seats, but I've done over 1000 miles on the stuff and it seems fine (so far).

Cheers,
Ian

Edit:
Just had a look at the cost of Castrol Valve master, might have a go with that after my Millers bottle runs out 😄

Edited by Smackfiend, 25 January 2017 - 03:37 PM.

[paulrockliffe]

I bought some additive, then when I put my head number into google I discovered that it's an SPI head, the only head that you can definitely identify as being unleaded from the cylinder head number.