That old wives tale - a bit of petrol in with the diesel to keep things clean

[airhead]

So is it true or not that 5 litres of petrol (gas) in a full tak of diesel will clean the fuel system and injectors and make the car less smokey? Ive often heard this, and admittedly tried it once or twice. I never noticed a real difference though. Whats the official standpoint on this? Is it a good idea or will it mess things up with the pump or whatever?

[RabbitJockey]

no clue, but i would much rather mix in a quart of automatic transmission fluid every once in a while

[macka]

Just finished talking with my uncle (an old old old school retired truck mechanic) He said in the 60's it was common practice on the diesels to use gas to clean the injectors after they had been removed from the engine. It was common for them to get coked up if they did a lot of low RPM stuff, especially the 2 stroke models.

[Jay]

Use Redex  It's meant to improve mileage and clean the injectors. But just read the info on the bottle before purchasing it, there are different versions of it for petrol and diesels (injector and carb).
 
I used the petrol version on my last Golf and it helped improve my mileage a bit, not sure if it cleaned up the carb, never bothered too look  It also made the car feel more responsive, which is always a good thing in a 1.6 carby.