I've used them on-and-off every once in a while on various cars and never noticed a difference - at any given point i think I've tried every commonly available brand, aside from the ones that cost $30+ at least once. no difference. nothing can really be proven by this because none of the vehicles had any fuel related problems at the time.

HOWEVER - my girlfriend's 97 VW golf recently had a failure of the PCV (not the positive crankcase ventilation valve, but the purge control valve - it is a smog device which works with the charcoal canister to ensure that your engine burns evaporated fuel gasses in your gas tank) - anyhow this failure caused "spoiled" gummy, diesel-like fuel to seep into the air intake of the engine and cause sticking valves, characterized by a miss at idle and no power below 2500rpm, then sudden "like a switch" appearance of full engine power. After finally tracking down and repairing the PCV, the stuck valves remained and utilizing Gunk brand fuel injector and intake cleanser in the gasoline appears to have almost 100% remedied the problem over a period of 2 treated tankfuls.

therefore if a problem of this nature exists it appears that the fuel additives do,in fact, do their job.

Also I have noticed a diffrence throwing in a can if I plan to be 13,000+ feet.

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Originally posted by Mitch2:
I use Redline Fuel Additive. I can feel the difference in power. This of course could also be the fresh air filter I installed but who knows... Oh yeah, Pep Boys sells the stuff for cheap.

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Here is my stance on fluid additives,

Ive been talking to my friends dad who is a chemical engineer and used to design stuff like fuel additives, this is what he shared with me.

First, there are two types of additives really, cleaners, and fluid "inhancers".

Cleaners he said are just as they sould, clean the crap out of injectors carbs and such. He recommended using them on a schedule, not because they add hp really, but because they will increase your average flow and life of your injectors. He said if you never let the get gummed up, you wont need that power feel you get when you add it once a year and cleans all the crap that has accumilated, he told me he uses them every 5,000 miles or so.

Next are the inhancers. What these do oviously is inhance the propertires of your fluid. You can boost octain, add lsd additive, and crap like that. Once again none of these additives offer a performance gain, they just to maintance for you from the inside out. Others stabilize petrol products like oil additives.

The last thing he shared with me is that no additive was magical. He laughed at me cause I was putting in one of those cans of compression restore at my last change. He said that short of seal reconditioner, nothing is going to save what is already super screwed. Only sonic cleaning can fix a really jammed injector, nothing will help your compression short of a bore and rebuild, and a cracked leaky seal or valve will allways be cracked dry and crappy intill you change it.

Thats why I throw in the injector cleaner and every oil change, and use oil additives to lower wear and tear on my engine, cause nothing is going to help in latter on, which comes out of a can for 12.95.

Joe