It was an achievement mate, especially as it was mostly modern(so fast and well handling)cars, as well as lorries, buses, coaches & tractors that were holding me up, along with a massive set of roadworks just north of Glasgow.

Just returned from Brighton, been down there watching the Veteran Car Club's London to Brighton. There was over 500 pre-1905 cars this year, amazing The 2cv has travelled 364miles without so much as a hiccup, not bad for 198,000miles . There was also a lot of other classic cars, from MGs to Morris Minors and many others. Perhaps an I2F Raid, with camping, for next year?

As Tesco is the nearest petrol station, I generally buy my fuel from there. I normally fill up with regular 95 octane unleaded, but I've found that the 2cv pinks quiet badly with Tesco's 95, so I changed to the new Momentum 99 octane that Tesco sells, and I've found that there is no detectable pinking. Well recently I've been up to Scotland, and in many places the only unleaded fuel is 95, so I've had to fill up with regular unleaded. Now here's the thing....... I've had no detectable pinking from the engine So when I returned home I put Tesco's regular unleaded in the tank.....And it pinks!! So from that little experiment, I can only assume that Tesco's 95 octane is more like 47.5 octane and isn't fit for purpose, so I don't think I'll be using that shite again.

I tend to alternate between super and regular to stave off pinking, at any one time I probably have a sloshy mixture of both in there, mine's from Tesco too.

Old-Nail,
you beat me to it, as I was just about to surmise that unless Jonathan had run his tank 'dry', then tipped out the 5 litres or so which was still left in there, he was probably running on a mix of 95 and 99 octane.

Thing is, if the timing is OK for 99 octane, it would only need to be retarded by 'about' 3 degrees to make it run without pinking on 95 octane.
I doubt if he'd notice any reduction in performance, but I reckon he would notice the reduced fuel bill...

It's also worth remembering that a 2CV engine should not need 99 octane fuel.

ken

To be honest, if, having double checked the timing and made sure it definitely wasn't a problem with the car, I was still convinced that Tesco's 95RON wasn't up to standard, I certainly wouldn't be spending any extra with them for their posher stuff. If you reckon their 95 is more like 91, then isn't their 99 likely to be more like 95?

As it is though, I thought the supermarket tended to get their petrol from exactly the same suppliers as the 'bigger' boys?

ive never noticed a difference in driving with the two, im not convinced to be hjonest,
i thimk its more physocological more than anything

I can only go with what I know. I've been very carefully listening (and feeling) for pinking, and I can say with some justification that the car pinks on Tesco's 95, but not on Tesco's 99 or just about any other brand 95. The timing is already retarded by about two teeth, maybe three, so I don't fancy retarding it any further. I agree that using 99 gives no more useful power gain, I wasn't looking for any, I was just trying to stop the engine from pinking. Having found that I can use BP/Shell/Total et al 95, I'll frequent those petrol stations from now on.

Having driven the car down to Brighton and back yesterday, I was/am very pleased with the way it's driving atm. I just need to find/fix the slight imbalance with the rear brakes, then I'll be very happy in deed. It's a strange one though, at low speed it's there, but the higher the speed gets, the less it's there and from motorway speeds the car brakes straight and true. Weird.

Jonathan,
it is rather odd, as'pulling' under braking is much more likely to be an imbalance in the steered wheels, borne out by the fact that our MOT test requires that there should be less than 25% difference on the front axle.
There is no minimum percentage difference specified for the rear brakes...

Might be worth calling in at your friendly neighbourhood MOT station to see if they'd pop it on the rollers?
That's what I did recently with a 1975 drummer on which I'd rebuilt the entire braking system during its chassis change.
As it was going a fair way home, I wanted to be sure that the brakes were as they should be.
Only 1 kg difference between the front brakes confirmed that they were fine and the 'fee' amounted to taking a packet of chocolate biscuits and a jar of coffee 'for the lads' next time I took a car in for a full test.

ken

Edit:
Reference provided, to illustrate that the above is not simply a product of my fevered imagination.
< http://www.carsparefinder.co.uk/blog/th ... g-systems/ >

It is a weird one, Ken. At very low speed, ie stop-start, nose to tail, 5mph, it almost feels like the NSR is doing most, if not all of the braking yet at normal speeds, ie 20mph+ it's absolutely fine, no problem at all The car doesn't feel dangerous, or I wouldn't drive it, it's just something I want to sort just to be certain.

EDIT When I say the NSR feels like it's doing most of the braking, I mean that I can feel the NSR suspension dipping on pressing the brake pedal.