Poll/discussion: What Kind Of Fuel Do You Use?

[RedTurbo850]

I've been running around w/ 87, but yesterday filled up w/ 89. So we'll see if the car runs better..

I understand the manual recommends 91 though...

[Gray850]

87. The car adjusts the timing and doesn't put out the peak performance numbers.

[prasamin]

search through polls. this has already been discussed 40 times over.

[PharmD]

93, but have debated cutting back to middle grade.

[Fudge_Brownie]

Call it a .20 cent difference between 87 and 93 per gallon.

And we'll pretend you fill up the entire 18 gallon tank, even though most people have ~2 gallons in it already.

Let's also pretend you buy 2 tanks a week for 52 weeks. (so at 320 miles per tankful, thats 33,280 miles in ONE year, and please if you wanna talk gas mileage, use search. But 320 miles on 18 gallons is a rather LOW 17.7mpg)

18 x .2 x 2 x 52 = $374.40 in "savings" in a drastic scenario using a person who drives a 17.7mpg car 33k miles a year.

For those who drive a 17.7mpg car 15k a year, you'd save $180 and prob actually save less since hopefully you're car is getting better gas mileage. If not, SEARCH.

In other words, you barely save anything buy switchin from 93 to 87.

[Guest 850T-5]

Don't skimp on fuel, there is no significant advantage.

Turbo vehicles NEED 91 octane as stated in the manual or the ECU will have to keep pulling back your timing to adjust to lower octane fuel you run which will slightly reduce performance and may even cost you small reduction in gas mileage.

For example a while back with my turbo I was running 87, I switched to 91 and was able to drive an extra 25 miles per tank of gas. I also was able to feel a slight improvement WOT so it definately doesn't pay to skimp.

It also doesn't pay to run cheap generic gas that might only save you a couple cents or a few cents even per gallon. Some cheap generic gas also leads to more valve deposits which will eventually also adversely further affect performance. I was running Valero for a while because it was cheaper, switched over to 76 where it actually made a small improvement WOT.

[speedn_j]

i use 93 always. when i drive out to california ...the gas there is sooo crappy that as soon as i fill a tank of the cali stuff my car runs like garbage.(idles crappy, sh1tty mpg, poor boosting) then as soon as i leave and get a good tank of non-ca gas it purrs again.

[jbilyeu]

In oregon premium fuel is 92. i have always used the 92 with an octane booster additve. runs like a champ, never pings (detonation)

[Kibim]

95 FTW. Gets better milege than 93 even. 93 is the lowest we get here.

[tca217]

It also doesn't pay to run cheap generic gas that might only save you a couple cents or a few cents even per gallon. Some cheap generic gas also leads to more valve deposits which will eventually also adversely further affect performance. I was running Valero for a while because it was cheaper, switched over to 76 where it actually made a small improvement WOT.

I don't know about other states but I live in So. Calif. and I drove a gas tanker for 5 years and I can tell you from experience that if you think you are getting better gas at the 76 than the fill em fast mom and pop station you are fooling yourself. I would load at the ARCO refinery and sometimes it would go to an ARCO station and sometimes it would go to a "cheapie" station and sometimes to a 76 station. Years ago it did make a difference but now it all comes from the same main tank at the same refineries. Whoever has the lowest price is where the stations buy their gas. There are a few "company" owned stations, but not very many and even those don't always get the gas from their own refineries. So what it boils down to is you get the same gas (the law madates certain levels of whatever is in it) at almost any station with very few exceptions. If you have to have a name brand and buy at a brand name station, so be it. The cheapie station across the street for 10 cents a gallon less has the same stuff in their tanks also. Here is another fact that might mess with you, if we went to a station with 8000 gallons of regular and could only fit 6000 gallons in the underground tanks, the rest would be dumped into the mid grade or premium tanks which ever had room. This was a few years ago but I am sure it is still a act that continues. Just thought you guys might like to hear the truth.

[adrianpike]

93 was good for another 5-odd degrees of timing for me.

[sion]

We're quite fortunate in Australia as we have three Premium Unleaded grades of fuel available at 95, 98 & recently, Shell have released a 100 octane variant at limited service stations on the east coast of Oz.

You may cry, but I even run my lawn mower on 98! :lol:

[JimKW]

I personally refuse to pay an extra $.20 a gallon when I notice no difference whatsoever in the way my cars run or the gas mileage. I read about it getting better mileage with higher actane and switched to 91 for several tanks. It did not make a difference so I went back to 87. Truthfully I don't trust the octane readings on the pumps so I buy the cheapest I can get. I do stick with Shell or BP though, since those are the gas cards I carry.

[Guest 850T-5]

Sure, of course, some of the gas does come from the same sources but NOT all of it does. There actually is also such thing as lesser quality gas from some sources . . . .

The gas at Valero or some cheap hole in the wall gas station is often NOT the same as brands as Shell or Union 76. There are differences and those kind of places usually get their gas from cheaper sources. I'm not saying this is always the case but often it is.

There was a definate difference after I had been running Valero and switched over to 76, same grade.

I was more surprised because I wasn't expecting any difference but there was a slight improvement in throttle response.

I didn't say MPG was necessarily better but obviously with that the quality of the gas would seem somewhat better. Better throttle response could improve MPG slightly of course but that's something I didn't pay attention to.

What I was saying gave me slightly improved MPG mainly was running the highest octane available fuel (91 here) when I used to cheap out and go with 87.

[PyROTech]

min 91, since gas station near me has either 87 or 94, i go 94 most of the time.