gen 1 best fuel

[nick crisp]

I'm inclined to think there are 2 arguments here.

1) Is a higher octane petrol going to offer discernible benefits in engine performance and / or fuel economy to a carbureted Fazer 1000?
2) Are the additives in a premium petrol such as Shell V-Power going to offer discernible benefits in engine performance and / or fuel economy to a carbureted Fazer 1000?

My personal opinion is;
1) No - The engine was not designed to nor has the ability to make use of higher octane fuel.
2) Quite possibly - If the additives clean up deposits that have built up in the jets and other areas of the fuel system that have formed over time.

I'd argue that folks who report an improvement in performance / fuel economy from using V-Power are more likely to be seeing this through the effect of the additives than the higher octane rating.

Yes, this is what I feel. I doubt that the higher octane is the reason that people notice improvements when using such fuels, and I think VNA may well be right in that it may actually adversely affect the running of older bikes (although I still wonder how that could make it feelbetter if it is effectively putting the ignition timing out). Much more likely to be to do with cleaning additives, anti-knock additives etc. I still do believe I noticed an improvement on stock Fazers, less glitchiness, and I think the sheer numbers of people reporting the same bears this out.
May I throw a couple of extra complications into the mix, as it were? The Fazer 1000 gen 1 was set up apparently to run on quite poor quality fuel as stock, and hence the fluffing at low revs they all seem to have. So what of the Ivans jet kits, and also the 3 or 4 degree timing mods, partly designed to adjust everything to higher quality fuels such as we have in Europe? How would these affect the arguments?